The Daily Mail reports that 31-year-old Michael Egan, the man accusing “X-Men” director Bryan Singer of drugging and raping him some 15 years ago, is working with documentary filmmaker Amy Berg on a “bombshell exposé of Hollywood’s sordid underbelly.”
Berg is an Oscar-nominated director whose previous credits include a documentary about the sex abuse cases that recently rocked the Catholic Church. IGN reports that Berg “has confirmed she’s been working on a documentary about Hollywood sexual abuse that contains allegations regarding Singer and others.”
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At Showbiz 411, longtime Hollywood reporter Roger Friedman sees a connection between the sexual abuse claims haunting Singer and a swindler named Dana Giacchetto, a one-time pal of Leonardo DiCaprio. Egan’s claim is that Singer and a man named Marc Collins-Rector set up a pedophilia ring that involved a company called Digital Entertainment Media (DEN). Collins-Rector ran the company, Singer was an investor, alleged-victims were paid-off using the company payroll.
According to Friedman, Giacchetto was involved in the financing of DEN.
[Egan’s] allegations fit in with another story I was reporting at that time, about criminal business manager and Ponzi schemer Dana Giacchetto (Leonardo DiCaprio and Mike Ovitz’s former BFF) and a company called DEN- Digital Entertainment Network, which was owned by Collins- Rector.
It’s a lurid story of Hollywood at its worst. Egan says today that he originally filed a suit in 2000, when all this was going on, but no one listened to him. Now it all may come out. And if Singer is culpable, the saga may involve a lot of well known names.
The Collins-Rector part of the story is what should concern all the parties involved.
In what may be the wildest coincidence in a long time…
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…with no connection to the Singer case, The Hollywood Reporter published a lengthy profile of Giacchetto yesterday morning. Other than the convicted swindler’s financial dealings, there is nothing in the story about any illegal or underage sexual misconduct involving Giacchetto, DiCaprio, or anyone. “Weird sex scenes” is as close as it gets, though nothing illegal, just the usual-usual Hollywood hedonism:
Sources, though none for the record, confirm Giacchetto’s accounts of the parties. “There were lots of weird sex scenes,” says one prominent Giacchetto partygoer. The loft had $300 champagne, $5,000 hookers, top models, rockers, actors and artists. There also were two cockatoos, Angel and Tiberius — one each for Giacchetto and DiCaprio. Victoria Leacock Hoffman, a friend of Andy Warhol, Martin Scorsese and Giacchetto, attended a Christmas party at the loft and later threw Molly Ringwald’s 30th birthday party there, both of which she says were fairly tame. “Leo was always sweet and gentlemanly,” she says.
Marc Collins-Rector, the apparent link between Giacchetto, DEN, and Singer, was convicted in 2004 of transporting minors across state lines for sexual acts and is now a registered sex offender.
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THR reports that the fallout for Singer continues after he dropped out of an upcoming “Creativity Conference” where he was scheduled to appear with Vice President Joe Biden. Singer has already dropped out of an appearance at Wondercon and had his name removed from ads promoting a new ABC television show he produced.
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The Daily Beast interviewed actor Jason Dottley, a man who attended Bryan Singer’s famous pool parties during the same time-frame Egan claims to have been drugged and raped. Dottley says he never witnessed anything illegal or improper:
According to an interview with recording artist and actor Jason Dottley, who attended pool parties hosted by Singer for nearly three years, the parties, while wild, were not occasions where he witnessed any of the kinds of criminal behavior detailed by Egan in his suit. “They were not large parties–20 or 30 people, max,” said Dottley. “Very chill, very relaxed–I never saw anyone doing drugs openly. There was usually a bartender making drinks. I remember a hot tub that could have held, like, 20 people. It felt like any kind of Friday night hangout, to be honest.”
According to Dottley, who described himself as “shy and body-conscious” at 19, Singer most often approached him. “He’d usually start a conversation with me–he was fond of the fact that I’m from the South. He was definitely an instigator [of the conversation], but I never felt intimidated. He never once came on to me, and I never saw him act that way to anybody else,” despite being “totally his type.”
What kind of guy merits attention from one of Hollywood’s most successful directors? “Fresh off the bus. New to the city, definitely young, 18, 19, 20, and good looking,” says Dottley, as photos posted by Gawker of the parties seem to show.
Be warned the full piece can get sexually explicit.
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Through his lawyer, Singer has denied Egan’s charges and says he can prove that he wasn’t in Hawaii when Egan claims the sexual abuse took place.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC
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