(Park City) In Pretty Baby: Brooke Shieldsa documentary premiered on Friday at the Sundance Film Festival in the United States, American actress Brooke Shields reveals that she was raped at the start of her Hollywood career.
The former model has kept the identity of her attacker a secret, but said she tracked down the man – whom she knew – shortly after graduating from college, believing him to be a a working meeting to discuss his participation in a new film.
The man took her back to her hotel, saying he wanted to call a taxi for her from her room. He instead went to the bathroom before emerging naked and raping her, she said.
“It was like a fight… I was afraid of being suffocated or something like that”, testifies the actress in the documentary.
“I didn’t struggle much. I did not do it. I was just completely petrified. I thought my “no” should have been enough. And I was just like, ‘stay alive and go’. »
After the assault, Brooke Shields recalls phoning a friend who worked in security, Gavin de Becker, who told her, “It’s rape,” to which she replied, “I’m not ready. to believe it”.
Until now, the actress had never spoken publicly about her attack.
This revelation, which echoes the #metoo wave, is one of many poignant moments in the film, which will be released on online streaming platform Hulu in two parts.
The first part is devoted to the intense sexualization that Brooke Shields was subjected to at a very young age, notably during a naked photo shoot at the age of 10, as well as after her appearance at 11 in the film. Pretty Baby in which she played a child prostitute.
PHOTO ARCHIVES PRESS
Brooke Shields in The Blue Lagoonin 1980
The documentary shows a young Brooke Shields facing lustful questions from much older men in talk showsabout his roles in movies like The Blue Lagoon Where Endless Loveand the controversial series of Calvin Klein commercials in which she appeared.
After experiencing world stardom as a teenager, the young woman went to Princeton University. After graduating, she initially struggled to find roles — leading to the grim encounter with her rapist.
“My personal message is perseverance, and not allowing yourself to become a victim in the eyes of any society or industry,” she told AFP ahead of the film’s premiere at the festival. organized until January 29 in Utah – for the first time in person in three years, because of the COVID-19.
I’m proud of how I’ve continued to learn, grow, work and love what I do.
Brooke Shields
The documentary, which earned Mme Shields to a standing ovation at Sundance, also recounts the media’s obsession with her virginity, her mother’s alcoholism and her first marriage to tennis star Andre Agassi. Several of his famous friends are interviewed there, including Lionel Richie, Laura Linney and Drew Barrymore.
The actress, who is now 57, said it was “a good time in [sa] life” to appear in a documentary.
Thursday had already been screened the documentary Justicewhich explores sexual assault charges against U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
Director Doug Liman’s first documentary (The Bourne Identity), it shows the testimony of Deborah Ramirez, one of Mr. Kavanaugh’s accusers, with whom she studied at Yale.
There also appears the audio recording of a man who studied with them, who says he saw the judge showing off in front of another woman, “very drunk”, at a party. This latest testimony only appeared in US media months after Mr Kavanaugh’s controversial nomination in 2018.
The woman in question, whose identity has not been revealed, says she does not remember the incident.
Brett Kavanaugh has denied any sexual assault.