In “The Hollywood Reporter”, two women accuse “Sex And The City” lead actor Chris Noth of raping them. Despite poignant and comprehensive testimony, the actor who plays Mister Big denies the facts.
Chris Noth, aka “Mister Big” in the series Sex And The City, has just been accused of rape and sexual assault by two women. Zoe and Lily testified anonymously in a river survey conducted by The Hollywood Reporter. They tell how the actor allegedly raped them, one in 2004 and the other in 2015.
At first, Zoe didn’t want that to be known. Indeed, she had preferred to bury the hatchet to move on. But when she saw the big promotion around the film And Just Like That… (Following Sex And The City), it brought back to her the trauma Chris Noth gave her in 2004. At that time, she was 22, he was 49. She would have met him at her workplace in Los Angeles. “He would come by my office a lot to flirt with me and one day, without knowing how, he got my work phone number and started texting me. “, she explains to journalists. My boss said to me then “There is still Mister Big who left you a voicemail”;
“You could at least put on a condom”
Then one day, he invites her to come to his building in West Hollywood. She would then have proposed to him to come with a friend who lived in the same building as the actor, which confirms her friend in question, and which he accepted. While the three of them were in the pool, Chris Noth allegedly handed Zoe a book so that she could give her his opinion on it. The young woman then felt flattered. When she went to say goodbye to him, while her friend was waiting for him in the pool, he would have taken the opportunity to pull her towards her, throw her on the bed and lower her shorts and bikini bottoms. It was then that he raped her.
The young girl remembers being in front of a mirror as she shouted for him to stop. “But he did not do it, she tells the newspaper, and then I said to him ‘You could at least put on a condom’, which made him laugh ”. When she left the apartment, her friend found her in a trance: “She was in the bathroom straight. She came out all clueless, a little distant, tells the latter. “Usually he’s a very sociable, sweet, friendly person.” She will then call her boss to explain what happened. The latter confirms that she was so shocked by the news that she had to stop her car and pull over to the side.
The need to bury the trauma
Zoe testifies at Hollywood Reporter the many nightmares and flashbacks that plagued his life as a result of this assault. In 2006, she contacted the UCLA Rape Center, an establishment that helps victims of rape, to try to turn the page. Also, she confides in her mother who tells her, in return, that she too has been a victim of rape. She was diagnosed with cancer in 2018. “On his deathbed, says Zoë, my mother was haunted by this aggression she had kept to herself. I didn’t want to find myself in the same situation. ”
“I had a bad feeling about him”
Lily’s testimony is equally overwhelming. She met the actor in 2015 when she was a waitress in the VIP area of a New York club. She is 25, he is 60. She admires him a lot for his role in Sex And The City but also in the detective series New York: Criminal Section. “I realized that he liked me, she says, I’m ashamed to admit it, but I knew he was married and I was still flattered that he was hitting on me “. That evening, he invites her to Il Cantori, the famous restaurant where he takes Carrie Bradshaw to dinner by candlelight in the hit series. She talks about this invitation to her friend Alex who advises her not to go there: “I had a bad feeling about him “.
But Lily doesn’t see where the danger is: “I have always been the mother of my group of friends so I did not see the warning signs when they concerned me “. Indeed, she thinks he invites her simply to get to know her better and to talk about career: “He asked me a lot of questions about my job and my ambitions in life “. When they left the restaurant, the actor allegedly offered to go up to his apartment to taste his collection of whiskey. Once home, he reportedly tried to sleep with her on several occasions: “I managed to hold him back, but he forced and forced and forced. I should have said “no” more firmly “, Lily explains.
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There too, the victim was facing a mirror
What she then testifies is appalling. “The only thing I remember is that moment when he pulled his pants down, stood straight in front of me, and forced his penis into my mouth. “, she testifies. Lily then tries to stop him by telling him that he is married and that he is the father of a family. To which he would have replied: “Marriage is a scam. Monogamy does not exist “.
Then he allegedly raped her, sitting on a chair, facing a mirror. “I cried all along, tells the young woman, when I was done, I went to the bathroom to put my skirt back on. I felt so bad. All my hopes for this star I admired have gone up in smoke “. She then orders an Uber and calls her friend Alex in the car. “She seemed completely scared. She told me that Noth had forced her to sleep with him “, tells the one who received the call.
“It would be great if it could stay between us”
The next day, she tries to minimize the facts and thinks she overreacted. But at that moment, Alex and Lily listen to a voicemail message sent by Chris Noth to the young woman. “He was like, ‘Hey, I hope you didn’t misinterpret what happened between us last night. It was very pleasant anyway. I just wanted to make sure you didn’t take it the wrong way ‘”, explains Alex who interprets this speech as an attempt by the actor to cover up the affair. Lily, instead, remembers hearing him say: “I had a great time with you, but I would very much appreciate it if you didn’t tell your friends about it. It would be great if it could stay between us. “
Witnessing brings back some pain but also relieves weight victims
Testifying today hurts these two women, it still makes them suffer. However, they admit that it also allows them to free themselves from a weight. Chris Noth, for his part, denies the facts. “The accusations against me made by these individuals whom I invited years, even centuries ago, are totally false., he explained, These stories could have been from 30 years or 30 days ago, no means no and that’s a line I haven’t crossed “.
For the actor, these relationships were agreed. He then implies in his speech that the moment of these testimonies coincides strangely with the release of the film. And Just Like That… He takes the opportunity to say that he did not attack these women. At the same time, by dint of seeing testimonies of rape and sexual violence, we begin to be accustomed to the denial of the alleged aggressors. The actor’s words are part of a constant delegitimization of the victims’ words as well as a mythology which consists in saying that a rape victim is an inveterate liar.