Journo's Experience With Morgan Freeman Leads to Expose

CNN's Chloe Melas started making calls after an allegedly inappropriate experience with him
By Kate Seamons,  Newser Staff
Posted May 24, 2018 11:14 AM CDT
Journo's Experience With Morgan Freeman Leads to Expose
In this Jan. 21, 2018, file photo, Morgan Freeman poses with his Life Achievement Award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.   (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

"He was looking at my breasts, and I told him, 'My eyes are up here.'" So says one of the women in a very lengthy CNN exclusive in which eight women in total accuse Morgan Freeman of inappropriate behavior. Another eight people said they witnessed his alleged behavior. The investigation was spurred after one of the article's co-authors, CNN entertainment reporter Chloe Melas, alleges Freeman spoke to her inappropriately during a press junket for Going in Style last year. Melas was six months pregnant and says she shook Freeman's hand but he wouldn't let go, kept looking her up and down, and made comments to the effect of "I wish I was there" and "you are ripe." She reported it to CNN HR—and then started calling around to see if other women had been in her shoes.

She and An Phung subsequently spent months reporting the piece. Their sources describe ogling; vulgar, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate comments; unwanted touching; and two instances in which the 80-year-old asked women to twirl. One of the more damning reports comes from a production assistant who was in her early 20s when she worked on the set of Going In Style in 2015. She alleges that at one point Freeman "kept trying to lift up my skirt and asking if I was wearing underwear." He didn't manage to, but she says he tried, even as she moved away, until co-star Alan Arkin told him to cut it out. She said her experience with Freeman spurred her to quit the industry. Read the full story at CNN for more on the allegations, many of which come from former staffers at Revelations Entertainment, the production company he started in 1996. (More Morgan Freeman stories.)

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