Gérard Depardieu Accused of Rape in France

Oscar-nominated actor Gérard Depardieu has been accused of rape and sexual assault by a 22-year-old actress in his native France.

According to France’s national news service, FranceInfo, a complaint was officially filed on Monday alleging rape and sexual assault at one of Depardieu’s homes in Paris with the public prosecutor’s office in Aix-en-Provence, who then passed it on to the Paris-based National Gendarmerie.

Attorney Herve Termime told Agent France Presse that his client Depardieu “absolutely denies any attack, any rape. I regret the public nature of this process which poses a major prejudice to Gérard Depardieu, whose innocence I am convinced will be recognised.”

Depardieu is arguably France’s most internationally-famous actor. He was most recently seen in Welcome to New York, which was based on the true story of the Dominique Strauss-Kahn scandal in which the head of the International Monetary Fund was accused of sexually assaulting a cleaner at a New York hotel in 2011. Strauss-Kahn, whom Depardieu played, was eventually acquitted after a very public trial. Depardieu was nominated for Best Actor in 1991 for his role in Cyrano de Bergerac.