Nov. 1, 2017
Natasha Henstridge was watching a cine on Brett Ratner’s couch aback she fell asleep. She was a 19-year-old actualization model; he was an advancing music video administrator in his aboriginal 20s. They had been blind out in advanced of the TV with accompany at his New York apartment.
But aback Henstridge woke up, the others had left. She was abandoned with Ratner. She got up to leave, Henstridge said, but he blocked the aperture with his anatomy and wouldn’t budge. He began affecting himself, she said, afresh affected her to accomplish articulate sex.
“He strong-armed me in a absolute way. He physically affected himself on me,” she said. “At some point, I gave in and he did his thing.”
Ratner, through his advocate Martin Singer, accustomed her account.
Since that adventure in the aboriginal 1990s, Henstridge has activate success as an added — starring in the films “Species” and “The Whole Nine Yards.” But she said she has agitated the anamnesis of the altercation with her, and watched from distant as Ratner became one of Hollywood’s best able players — directing, bearing or costs dozens of today’s better box-office hits, including “Rush Hour,” “X-Men: The Aftermost Stand,” “The Revenant” and “Horrible Bosses.”
As hundreds of women accept arise advanced in contempo weeks with allegations of animal delinquency at the easily of ambassador Harvey Weinstein, administrator James Toback and abundant added able men, Henstridge absitively she would no best abide silent.
In interviews with the Los Angeles Times, Henstridge and bristles added women accused Ratner of a ambit of animal aggravation and delinquency that allegedly took abode in clandestine homes, on cine sets or at industry events.
As is generally the case, none of the women arise the allegations to the police.
On Ratner’s behalf, Accompanist “categorically” accustomed their accounts.
“I accept represented Mr. Ratner for two decades, and no woman has anytime fabricated a affirmation adjoin him for animal delinquency or animal harassment,” Accompanist said in a 10-page letter to The Times. “Furthermore, no woman has anytime requested or accustomed any banking adjustment from my client.”
It feels as if I accumulate activity up adjoin the aforementioned annoyer at academy who aloof won't quit.
Actress Olivia Munn
Olivia Munn said that while visiting the set of the 2004 Ratner-directed “After the Sunset” aback she was still an ambitious actress, he masturbated in advanced of her in his bivouac aback she went to bear a meal. Munn wrote about the adventure in her 2010 accumulating of essays afterwards allotment Ratner. On a television actualization a year later, Ratner articular himself as the director, and claimed that he had “banged” her, article he afterwards said was not true. The aforementioned year her book was published, Munn ran into Ratner at a affair befuddled by Creative Artists Bureau and he boasted of ejaculating on anniversary covers featuring her image, she told The Times.
She said that assiduous apocryphal rumors that they had been affectionate accept affronted her, bidding her to allocution to The Times in abutment of added women who are “brave abundant to allege up.”
“I've fabricated specific, careful choices not to assignment with Brett Ratner,” Munn said.
“It feels as if I accumulate activity up adjoin the aforementioned annoyer at academy who aloof won't quit,” she said. “You aloof achievement that abundant bodies accept the accuracy and for abundant time to canyon so that you can't be affiliated to him anymore.”
Ratner “vehemently disputes” Munn’s allegations, Accompanist said.
A playboy persona
Ratner, 48, has connected boastful his playboy persona, aloof about about his animal prowess. He has been romantically affiliated to the brand of Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and Mariah Carey. In December, Tina Fey, speaking at the Hollywood Reporter’s anniversary Women in Ball breakfast, cracked: “Brett Ratner is here. In his defense, he anticipation this was a affair area you could eat breakfast off of 100 women.”
For years, he palled about with Robert Evans, the slick-haired above assembly arch at Paramount Pictures who was afterwards bedevilled of trafficking cocaine, and Toback, who, as The Times arise aftermost month, has been accused of animal delinquency by added than 300 women. In a January anniversary with Variety, Ratner said Evans, Toback and Roman Polanski, who was bedevilled of accepting actionable sex with a accessory in 1977, were amid his “closest friends.”
After Ratner quipped that “rehearsal is for fags” while actualization at a 2011 screening of his blur “Tower Heist,” he was broadly criticized. The misstep amount him a asset gig: He bound accommodated from bearing the 2012 Academy Awards advertisement and issued an apology, calling it a “dumb way of cogent myself.”
In interviews, Ratner has approved to bland out the asperous edges of his bad-boy image, abnormally added recently, as he has broadcast his business ventures. In 2012, Ratner co-founded assembly aggregation RatPac Entertainment. A year later, RatPac partnered with now-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s Dune Ball to actualize the advance agent RatPac-Dune Entertainment, which active a co-financing accord with Warner Bros. anniversary about $450 million. Amid Ratner’s controlling bearing credits via those companies are “Jersey Boys” and “Black Mass.”
The filmmaker generally has told reporters that he doesn’t use drugs or booze alcohol. Sometimes, in enumerating his abridgement of vices, Ratner additionally credibility out his adulation of admirable women, saying, for example, in a 2008 Jewish Journal story: “I'm not into aphotic stuff. I'm aloof a nice Jewish kid ... who loves movies and appealing girls."
Actress Jaime Ray Newman said Ratner put it added bluntly to her, answer in barnyard agreement that he bald sex — not booze or drugs.
Newman said she encountered Ratner in 2005 aback they were both in aboriginal chic on an Air Canada flight. The filmmaker swapped seats with his abettor afore abandonment so he could be abutting to her, she said. Newman, who was on her way to shoot her aboriginal above acting role on the TV actualization “Supernatural,” was aflame to allocution with a “famous director” about to captain “X-Men: The Aftermost Stand,” she said.
Within bristles anniversary of the alike demography off, she said, Ratner began audibly anecdotic sex acts he capital to accomplish on her in absolute detail. He additionally showed her nude photos of his then-girlfriend, said Newman, 39, who stars on Netflix’s accessible “The Punisher.”
“He was graphically anecdotic giving me articulate sex and how he was absorbed to it,” she said.
Newman said she was so annoyed by the appointment that she anon told a scattering of bodies about it. Both her mother and a acquaintance accepted to The Times that the added aggregate capacity anon afterwards the flight.
Ratner, through his attorney, denied that the adventure occurred, apropos to it as a “ridiculous claim.”
Actress Katharine Towne additionally declared an advancing attraction by Ratner that larboard her so afflictive that she said she still vividly remembers the adventure years later. She said she met the administrator in L.A. about 2005 at a affair in a cine star’s home, area he fabricated exceptionable advances. Ratner, she said, was persistent, “making it axiomatic that he had one motive” — to beddy-bye with her.
“He started to arise on to me in a way that was so extreme,” said Towne, 39, whose credits accommodate the blur “What Lies Beneath.” The actress, who is the babe of “Chinatown” biographer Robert Towne, absolved herself. Ratner followed her into a bathroom.
“I anticipate it’s appealing advancing to go in the bath with addition you don’t apperceive and abutting the door,” Towne said.
She said she was nervous, and approved to accomplish a antic about her weight: “I don’t alike apperceive what you appetite with me. I’m affectionate of ample appropriate now.” He was undeterred. “I like ’em ample sometimes,” she said Ratner replied. Towne gave Ratner her number, acquisitive to appease him. Ratner’s abettor declared her for the abutting six months, abominably aggravating to align a banquet for her and the filmmaker, she said.
Ratner’s advocate Accompanist declared Towne’s anniversary “absurd.” “Even if apparently this adventure occurred absolutely as claimed, how is flirting at a party, complimenting a woman on her appearance, and calling her to ask her for a date blameworthy conduct?” Accompanist said.
Although some accept questioned his conduct, Ratner has defenders in the industry including bristles above administration who accept formed carefully with him throughout the years. David Steiman, Hopi Dobuler, Drew Sherman, Brett Gursky and Izak Rappaport all said that they did not attestant him misbehave and accepted him as a bang-up and mentor.
Steiman, who was Ratner’s abettor from 1999 to 2004, said he never saw him abuse women, and would be "shocked" if such conduct occurred. Steiman acclaimed that Ratner anachronous added Rebecca Gayheart and tennis brilliant Serena Williams during his time alive for the filmmaker.
Said Dobuler, a longtime above abettor to Ratner: “I anticipate he’s great. ... He’s a ancestors guy.”
Over the years, Ratner has accustomed several ceremoniousness for his altruistic and altruistic endeavors. On Sunday, the Jewish National Fund presented Ratner with its anniversary Tree of Life Accolade at a bright in Hollywood area the guests included blur ambassador Avi Lerner, United Talent Bureau co-founder Jim Berkus and Singer.
Gal Gadot, the Israeli brilliant of “Wonder Woman,” had been slated to accord the accolade to Ratner, but as The Times was advertisement on his declared animal misbehavior aftermost week, the actress’ arranger arise she would not arise at the accident because of a scheduling conflict.
Instead, "Wonder Woman" administrator Patty Jenkins, who has accepted Ratner for years, presented him the award, saying: "He’s gone on to be this absolute ability in this town. He’s a big character. He’s a big personality. But you apperceive what I adulation about Brett, he wants that for everybody abroad too."
Munn’s Ratner run-ins
New to Los Angeles and advancing an acting career, Munn said she was captivated aback a acquaintance arrive her to the set of "After the Sunset.” "I was so excited, because I mean, that's why you arise out to California and Hollywood," recalled the actress, 37, whose credits now accommodate HBO's "The Newsroom" and the movies "Magic Mike” and "X-Men: Apocalypse."
Not connected afterwards Munn accustomed on the Santa Monica set in 2004, she said, she was asked to bead some aliment off in Ratner's bivouac as a favor. She said she was assured that the administrator would not be there.
Munn entered Ratner’s bivouac and bound placed the aliment on a table. She said she was abashed to acquisition him inside. She approved to accomplish a quick exit, but Ratner implored her not to leave.
"He absolved out ... with his abdomen afraid out, no pants on, shrimp cocktail in one duke and he was angrily masturbating in the other," Munn said. "And afore I actually could alike amount out area to escape or area to look, he ejaculated."
Munn said she let out a "startled scream" and raced out of the trailer. She said she anon told the man who had asked her to bear the food. His reaction? “It wasn't a shock. It wasn't surprise,” Munn recalled. “It was just, ‘Ugh, apologetic about that.’"
Munn said she larboard the set and declared her sister, Sara Potts, who apprenticed her to allege with a lawyer. Potts accepted Munn’s account.
The advocate dissuaded her from activity up adjoin a able administrator as a apprentice actress, so she did nothing.
“That did leave an appulse on me,” Munn said, absorption on the conversation. "How burst do women accept to be afore bodies listen?"
She wrote about the adventure in her book, “Suck It, Admiration Woman! The Misadventures of a Hollywood Geek” — but bald out names and details. During a 2011 actualization on “Attack of the Show,” a television affairs Munn ahead co-hosted, Ratner articular himself as the bearding director, but denied masturbating in advanced of her. “I acclimated to date Olivia Munn, I will be honest with everybody here,” he said. “When she was ‘Lisa.’ That was the problem. She wasn’t Asian aback then.”
“I banged her a few times ... but I forgot her,” he said.
Days later, he went on the Howard Stern actualization and accepted he never slept with Munn and bidding attrition for authoritative her attending like “a whore.”
“I acquainted horrible,” he told the Sirius XM Radio host. “I said I banged her three times, which wasn’t true.”
In acknowledgment to questions from The Times, Accompanist said that Munn and Ratner had absolutely had “an affectionate relationship.” Munn declared that as “a complete lie.”
“I shouldn’t accept to be absolutely broken, battered, and attenuated in adjustment to prove that he beyond a line,” she said.
I shouldn’t accept to be absolutely broken, battered, and attenuated in adjustment to prove that he beyond a line.
Olivia Munn
Munn said she connected to run into Ratner at a scattering of Hollywood events.
In 2010, afterwards afresh actualization on the awning of a magazine, she abounding a CAA-hosted affair where, she said, Ratner asked her, "Why do you abhorrence me?" She said she told him: "It's added of a dislike."
Ratner grew angry, she said, and responded: “Why? I bought 10 of your magazines and came over all of them.”
Singer said Ratner “has no bond of authoritative such a statement.”
Immediately afterwards the run-in, Munn told her acquaintance Cara McConnell, whom she had brought to the party, about what transpired.
“She came up to me appropriate afterwards,” McConnell said. “She [said] ‘I can’t accept this happened to me. I can’t accept he did that.’”
An amateur who overheard the chat accepted Munn’s account. A third partygoer accepted actuality told anon about the “vulgar” appointment from addition who overheard it directly.
On the set of ‘Rush Hour 2’
The claimed adventure with Munn is not the abandoned one to allegedly action on set of a Ratner-helmed film.
Four bodies who were complex in the assembly of Ratner’s “Rush Hour 2” in Las Vegas in 2001 declared a sexually answerable atmosphere — one in which the administrator was advancing women. The PG-13 blur includes several scenes featuring women in bikinis and lingerie, and the set, according to these people, was abundant with admirable adolescent women.
Eri Sasaki, afresh a 21-year-old part-time archetypal and ambitious singer, said her role as an added appropriate her to abrasion a deficient accouterments that apparent her midriff. While cat-and-mouse for filming to activate one day, Ratner approached her, ran his basis feel bottomward her bald abdomen and asked if she capital to go into a bath with him. Aback she said no, she recalled Ratner saying, "Don't you appetite to be famous?"
A day or two later, Ratner afresh asked her to go into the bath with him, and afresh asked if she capital to be a cine star. He offered to accord her a band of chat in the film. Sasaki said no.
Singer said Ratner has no bond of the declared incident.
Jorina King additionally formed as a accomplishments added on the film.
On the aboriginal day of shooting, King said, Ratner plucked her from a army of changeable annual and said he afterwards capital to altercate giving her a speaking part.
The abutting day, he asked her to arise to his bivouac and told her he bald to see her breasts, she said. King said she abandoned his appeal and hid in a restroom. “I ample if I could break out of his eyesight, if I could break abroad from him, he will balloon about me and he will accept addition else, and that is absolutely what happened,” King said, abacus that she feared him — and accident the work.
Kent Richards, who was a assembly abettor on the set of “Rush Hour 2,” said that Sasaki told him, during the production, about her acquaintance with Ratner. He additionally said he recalled a chat in which King bidding actuality afflictive on set, and referenced Ratner. Richards additionally said two or three added accomplishments actresses complained to him, alleging that Ratner asked them to actualization him their breasts or to blow his penis. Accompanist accustomed Richards’ account, calling it a “secondhand adventure about bearding individuals.”
David Anthony, whose aggregation at the time, Accomplishments Players, handled annual casting for the film’s shoot in L.A. and Las Vegas, said that three accomplishments actresses who formed on the activity told him that Ratner had asked them out on “dates.”
“In Brett’s defense, I am abiding he is not the abandoned heterosexual man hitting on women on that set,” he said.
King, who afterwards founded the accomplishments casting bureau Wild Streak Talent, said that she’d dealt with abrupt men on cine sets, but annihilation like Ratner.
“He feels entitled, that this is what he wants, this is how it is activity to be, and this feels like accustomed business to him,” she said.
Singer declared King’s claims “absurd” and “nonsensical.” “The cine was acutely already casting and shooting, so the angle that there would be a altercation of accepting her a speaking role in the average of a cine shoot is ridiculous,” Accompanist said.
He provided a annual by James M. Freitag, an abettor administrator on the set, who said that he accustomed no such complaints during “Rush Hour 2” filming.
“Any complaints of any affectionate including animal aggravation would be anon directed to my attention,” Freitag said. “There were no complaints arise to me whatsoever.”
Seeing Ratner afresh
Since their appointment in New York in the 1990s, Henstridge, 43, has beyond paths with Ratner abundant times in Hollywood, including already during the aftermost ten years at a affair with her acquaintance Amy Del Rio.
"She saw addition in the army and her anatomy accent changed," said Del Rio, an ball lawyer. "I asked her if she was OK and she said 'no.' Afresh I saw she was attractive at Brett Ratner. I asked if she knew him. She said, 'He's not a acceptable guy. I knew him aback in the day in New York.' She was absolutely weird, like, 'I wanna get out of here.'"
Henstridge abundant the declared appointment with Ratner to Del Rio abandoned aural the aftermost month. But three added bodies — a above boyfriend, a acquaintance and a abutting acquaintance — accepted to The Times that Henstridge told them about the adventure over a almost 10-year aeon alpha in the mid-1990s.
Although he accustomed spending time with her, Ratner accustomed Henstridge’s claims. Accompanist accused the added of actuality “upset afterwards acquirements my applicant had a adherent who he would not leave” for her.
Henstridge told The Times that she was not absorbed in dating Ratner and, afore that night, had never been abandoned with him.
Henstridge’s acquaintance Lilith Berdischewsky said that the added told her about the adventure with Ratner in the mid-2000s. “I bethink aback she was activity to some audience and she says, ‘I don’t apperceive whether I should go or not, but [Ratner] apparently is not activity to be there.’ And she came aback and she was shaking,” Berdischewsky recalled.
Indeed, Henstridge, who afresh appeared on the television shows “Medinah” and “Beauty & the Beast,” went to an audience for the TV ball "Prison Break," which Ratner controlling produced, alive he ability be in the room.
"And he was," said the actress, who has two sons, ages 16 and 19. "I had two adolescent kids and had to go to assignment and accomplish a living. And he aloof acted like we were old accompany from aback in the day in New York, saying, 'I haven't apparent you in years.' Auditioning is already bad enough. But aggravating to focus on the work, I aloof acquainted sick."
She didn’t get the part.
amy.kaufman@latimes.com
@AmyKinLA
daniel.miller@latimes.com
@danielnmiller
Times agents writers Victoria Kim, Andrew Khouri and Glenn Whipp contributed to this report.
ALSO
Beverly Hills badge barrage animal advance investigations involving Harvey Weinstein and James Toback
NPR arch editor is placed on leave afterwards animal aggravation accusations
After NBC ousts Mark Halperin over animal aggravation claims, TV account admiral admiration who is next
