(Updated with Harvey Weinstein lawyer statement) Disney, CAA and Miramax are being sued by Julia Ormond over an alleged sexual assault by Harvey Weinstein in 1995.
While the Legends of the Fall actress does not name her then-agents Bryan Lourd and Kevin Huvane or former Disney executives Jeffery Katzenberg and Michael Eisner in the filing made Wednesday in New York State Supreme Court, the suit does reference the quartet numerous times.
Although the alleged assault occurred nearly 30 years ago after a business dinner in New York City, Ormond is able to pursue the legal action because of the state’s Adult Survivors Act.
Claiming the now-incarcerated Weinstein forced himself upon her for oral sex, Ormond alleges that CAA and Disney — the latter of which owned Weinstein’s Miramax — knew of the Oscar-winning producer’s predatory behavior and did nothing to protect her.
Ormond claims in the suit that her reps at CAA dissuaded her from taking legal action at the time against Weinstein to avoid incurring his wrath. In that context, the suit alleges that Ormand’s CAA team knew of “multiple confidential settlements that Weinstein reached to keep his conduct hidden from public exposure.”
The actress’ complaint actually says Lourd and Huvane cited the standard settlement figure with the then mogul being about $100,000.
“The men at CAA who represented Ormond knew about Weinstein,” the filing exclaims “So too did Weinstein’s employers at Miramax and Disney. Brazenly, none of these prominent companies warned Ormond that Weinstein had a history of assaulting women because he was too important, too powerful, and made them too much money.”
The suit for battery (against Weinstein), negligent supervision and retention (against Miramax and Disney), negligence (CAA), breach of fiduciary duty (against CAA), also claims Weinstein retaliated and Miramax terminated Ormond’s contract ceasing commitments to the projects in development, and that CAA transferred her to a younger, inexperienced agent, and no longer was working on her behalf, significantly lessening and changing their representation of her.
“After living for decades with the painful memories of my experiences at the hands of Harvey Weinstein, I am humbled and grateful to all those who have risked speaking out,” Ormond said today in a statement from her lawyers. “Their courage and the Adult Survivors Act has provided me a window of opportunity and way to shed light on how powerful people and institutions like my talent agents at CAA, Miramax and Disney enabled and provided cover for Weinstein to assault me and countless others. I seek a level of personal closure by holding them accountable to acknowledge their part and the depth of its harms and hope that all of our increased understanding will lead to further protections for all of us at work.”
Neither Disney nor CAA responded to the allegations after a request from Deadline. We will update the post if they do.
However, the one of the current lead lawyers for the much accused and convicted Weinstein certainly had something to say.
“Harvey Weinstein categorically denies the allegations made against him by Julia Ormond and he is prepared to vehemently defend himself,” declared Imran H. Ansari in a statement Wednesday. “This is yet another example of a complaint filed against Mr. Weinstein after the passing of decades, and he is confident that the evidence will not support Ms. Ormond’s claims,” the Aidala, Bertuna & Kamins PC partner added.
Weinstein, 74, is currently in jail in Los Angeles after begin sentenced to 16 years for rape and other sex crimes this past February. That came after he was sentenced to 23 years by a Manhattan judge in March 2020 for other rape and other sex crimes.
The Ormond lawsuit, first reported today by Variety, was filed by Wigdor LLP.