Rose McGowan accuses director Alexander Payne of sexual misconduct

Hollywood actor Rose McGowan has accused Oscar-winning filmmaker Alexander Payne of sexual misconduct that occurred when she was 15 years old.

Alexander Payne. You sat me down & played a soft-core porn movie you directed for Showtime under a different name. I still remember your apartment in Silverlake. You are very well-endowed. You left me on a street corner afterwards. I was 15. pic.twitter.com/mVqiN4S9NW

— Rose McGowan (@rosemcgowan) August 17, 2020

“Alexander Payne. You sat me down & played a soft-core porn movie you directed for Showtime under a different name. I still remember your apartment in Silverlake. You are very well-endowed. You left me on a street corner afterwards. I was 15,” McGowan tweeted on August 17.

I just want an acknowledgement and an apology. I do not want to destroy. This was me at 15. pic.twitter.com/XeNpsrpY4s

— Rose McGowan (@rosemcgowan) August 17, 2020

In a follow-up tweet, the actress shared a photo of herself at 15 years old, writing, “I just want an acknowledgement and an apology. I do not want to destroy.”

McGowan has given more details about her alleged encounter with Payne to Variety.

“I feel very badly for my 15-year-old self. I had auditioned for him. He took me home afterward. I quit acting after that and then was discovered by Ilene Staple six years later,” McGowan told Variety. “It wasn’t until after the Harvey Weinstein stories came out that I reframed the Payne of it all. I had for years looked at it as a sexual encounter, not understanding what it really was. It was a grooming situation. The first time I’d been shown a straight porn.” 

As reported by The Cut, McGowan’s accusations match with the ones hinted at during an interview in 2018 with journalist Ronan Farrow. 

"He took me home, after he met me, and showed me a soft-porn movie he'd made for Showtime, under a different name, of course," she said. "And then he had sex with me. And then he left me next to Tropical in Silver Lake, standing on a street corner."

McGowan , a key figure in the #MeToo movement, was one of the first women who went public with rape allegations against Harvey Weinstein.

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