Dame Joan Collins was forced to hide in a wardrobe to escape the clutches of a predatory movie producer.
The 84-year-old actress entered the film business at the age of 16 and Dame Joan’s early experiences of the industry’s notorious casting couch culture has left her with haunting memories.
She recalled: "When I finally got my first audition for first big role at Ealing Studios. I would get on bus, train, then walk. One of the producers always used to try and catch me. And push me up against the wall, stroke my arm.
"He was tall and smelly and horrible and I would push him away. I wouldn’t think this had anything to do with the part. One day he finally caught me. The wonderful dresser hid me in the wardrobe."
When she was caught by the unnamed movie producer, it was suggested to Dame Joan that she needed to give in to his demands in order to be cast in the film.
Speaking to UK TV show ‘This Morning’, she shared: "Shortly after that he did get me. I finally got in the car with him, he said he’d give me a lift. He behaved, I know that children are watching, totally inappropriately. He had undone himself and taken my hand. I just said no it’s horrible. He kind of laughed at me and called me something rather rude, frigid little ‘b’.
"And he said I won’t get the role and asked if I wanted it. I said, ‘Yes I really do’. He insinuated if I didn’t go along with what he was doing I wouldn’t get it. Luckily the director, a lovely man, wanted me so I go the role. But I had to escape from his clutches all the time."
Dame Joan also revealed that she was told by older, more established actresses that such behaviour was typical within the movie industry, and that she needed to conform in order to further her career.
Recalling another incident of sexual harassment, she said: "He did grab me in the corridor, very inappropriate, hissing in my ear. Smelling of cigarette smoke and BO, said the most horrible vile things to me.
"He had in his office a gold paper weight made of his nether regions which was supposedly the stuff of legend. I don’t want to know that legend."
But Dame Joan – who was warned about sexual predators in Hollywood by the American icon Marilyn Monroe, among others – feels the culture could soon be exposed following the allegations made against producer Harvey Weinstein.
The former ‘Dynasty’ actress claimed that industry figures on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean will be fearful of the casting couch culture being revealed to the world.
She explained: "I think a lot of people, not only in Hollywood, but in the British film industry are quaking in their boots. Not only is it endemic – it’s acceptance.
"I have a grandchild who wants to be in showbiz and I don’t want her to have to go through what I had to go through."
Joan Collins hid in a wardrobe to escape producer’s advances
