Update: Ben Affleck apologized for “acting inappropriately” toward Burton in a post to his Twitter account Wednesday.
“I acted inappropriately toward Ms. Burton and I sincerely apologize,” the actor wrote.
Original story below:
Hollywood’s greatest fear is now coming true. The Daily Mail reports that Harvey Weinstein protégé Ben Affleck is facing the accusation that he groped actress Hilarie Burton in 2003 when she was just 21 years-old.
This is Hollywood’s greatest fear realized, the fear that the floodgates against others will open up and every alleged harasser will be dragged kicking and screaming into the sunlight. Affleck is a major player; an Oscar-winning director and Warner Brothers’ Batman, a hugely expensive franchise. He is also a high-profile Democrats, just like Harvey.
This is already the biggest scandal in Hollywood’s long, sordid history, Second place is not even close. But if even more women are now encouraged to come forward against other big names, the entire industry could be damaged beyond comprehension.
The same is true for the multinational corporations who employed these alleged harassers, the Walt Disney Company, for instance. Major corporate liability is definitely on the table.
Hilarie Burton claims she was groped by Ben Affleck during his appearance on TRL in 2003.
The former host of the show made the shocking allegations on Tuesday night, just hours after Affleck made a statement condemning Harvey Weinstein’s alleged abusive actions in his sexual assault and harassment scandal.
In it he said he was ‘saddened and angry’ over the ‘sickening’ claims.
Affleck’s statement was quickly slammed by a number of people – including Rose McGowan who called Affleck a liar.
When a fan tweeted that Affleck might as well have ‘kept quiet,’ another Twitter user wrote: ‘He also grabbed Hilarie Burton’s breasts on TRL once. Everyone forgot though.’
The One Tree Hill Star then surprised the Twitter thread by interjecting with: ‘I didn’t forget.’
Actress Rose McGowan is also publicly attacking Affleck as a liar over his statement Tuesday where he appeared to claim that Weinstein’s behavior was something he was unaware of until now.
Affleck and McGowan appeared together in the 1998 flop Phantoms, which was produced by Dimension, a branch of Harvey’s company Miramax.
McGowan also lit into Affleck’s lifelong friend Matt Damon. He tweet appears to accuse him of being aware of Weinstein’s behavior and covering it up.
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