Alexander Payne issues denial after Rose McGowan allegations

Alexander Payne has issued a denial following Rose McGowan’s allegations that the director “groomed” and sexually assaulted her at the age of 15. In a new column for Deadline, Payne shot down various claims by McGowan, beginning with her account that they met when she was 15 years old in the late 1980s. The alleged …

Alexander Payne has issued a denial following Rose McGowan’s allegations that the director “groomed” and sexually assaulted her at the age of 15.

In a new column for Deadline, Payne shot down various claims by McGowan, beginning with her account that they met when she was 15 years old in the late 1980s. The alleged incident would’ve happened around 1988, when Payne, now 59, was about 27.

“I was a full-time film student at UCLA from 1984 until 1990, and I know that our paths never crossed,” Payne wrote. He also denied showing her a soft-core adult film, as McGowan alleged.

“She claims that I showed her a ‘soft-core porn movie’ I had directed for Showtime ‘under a different name.’ This would have been impossible, since I had never directed anything professionally, lurid or otherwise. I have also never worked for Showtime or directed under any name other than my own,” Payne wrote.

Payne claimed he didn’t meet McGowan until 1991 during her audition for a comic short he was making for a Playboy Channel series. It was also his first directing gig.

“Although she did not get the part, she left a note for me at the casting desk asking that I call her,” Payne wrote in his column. “I had no reason to question how old she was, since the role she read for required an actor who was of age. We later went out on a couple of dates and remained on friendly terms for years.”

He concluded his column by saying: “While I cannot allow false statements about events twenty-nine years ago to go uncorrected, I will continue to wish only the best for Rose.”

The “Scream” actress previously said on social media of the allegations, “For years I had thought a man I had sexual relations with was a sexual experience I had. I now know I was groomed. I auditioned for him at 15.

The now-46-year-old said she came to a realization about Payne three weeks after sexual abuse allegations against Harvey Weinstein surfaced. McGowan has been vocal about her accusation of rape against Weinstein.

Following his column for Deadline posting, McGowan told Variety when contacted for comment: “F–k him and his lies is my comment.”

She continued, “I told Payne to acknowledge and apologize, he has not. I said I didn’t want to destroy, now I do. Why do these men always lie? I will now make it a mission to expose him. I am not the only one.”