Paul Schrader accused of having sexually harassed the former assistant

Paul Schrader, the screenwriter behind Taxi driver,, Unleashing bull,, American Gigolo And Afflictionwas accused of sexually harassing his former assistant and withdrawing payment payments.

In a trial brought in New York on Thursday, the 26 -year -old woman, identified as Jane Doe, says Schrader assaulted her sexually during the Cannes Film Festival “by attracting her in a hotel room and grabbing her by force and kissing her, despite her verbal protests”. Schrader was in Cannes for the first of his last film, Oh, Canada.

The woman – who worked for Schrader from May 2021 to September 2024 – managed to free herself and flee the hotel room, indicates the costume.

Three days later, the woman returned to the scriptwriter’s hotel room after having “received numerous angry calls and messages, in which the defendant Schrader said he” died “and could not pack his own bags”, according to the trial. When he opened the door, Schrader “wore nothing but an open bathrobe, with his fully exposed penis”.

The woman declares that she packed her bags “in terrified silence” as quickly as possible before leaving her hotel room.

The trial claims that Schrader “has shown in writing several times that he understood that his conduct was undesirable and offensive” for his former assistant, “however he knowingly made harassment and touch it by force.” The complaint includes emails that the screenwriter allegedly sent to Jane Doe, such as writing on May 22, 2023, “I feel that you are uncomfortable with my affection for you.”

After pretending to refuse Schrader’s sexual advances, the woman claims that he “retaliated against her and dismissed her job” in September 2024.

Two days later, the prosecution alleys that Schrader sent his former assistant an email in “full recognition of his illegal and predator behavior”, writing, “so I fucked up.

Afterwards, the trial indicates that the woman has retained a legal advisor and that their lawyers agreed to settle for Schrader to pay a confidential amount to resolve her allegations. However, Schrader would have resumed the signing of the agreement. After several weeks, the woman’s lawyer says that Schrader decided that he “could not live with himself” if he accepted the regulations and repudiated the binding agreement.

Schrader’s lawyer Philip Kessler said The Hollywood Reporter Friday, the legal deposit is a “desperate, opportunistic and frivolous trial to enforce a regulation which has never been signed by Schrader”.

Kessler said the charges mentioned in the trial are “in many ways, in other respects, important and exaggerated, Mr. Schrader has never had sex with his former assistant. He has never tried to have sex with his former assistant. The circumstances here will have been very wild out of proportion to reality. ” He added: “We intend to vigorously defend the case.”