Winona Ryder says being 'blatantly' sexually harassed in her 20s and 30s 'soured' her desire to make movies
"All the great actors always told me that when it stops being amazing, you gotta get out," the actress recalled. "I really took that to heart."
Winona Ryder is opening up about how her experience of being sexually harassed in her late 20s and 30s affected her passion for making movies.
While the actress declined to identify the perpetrators, she explained that the incidents had a profound effect on her personally and professionally. "I had a couple of difficult experiences with a couple of people who were just blatantly sexually harassing me," Ryder recalled in a new Esquire U.K. interview. "It wasn't an assault. But it was incredibly inappropriate. It was wild. I really understand [what the victims of Harvey Weinstein and others went through]."
Ryder said she was "lucky" the incidents "didn't happen as much" to her because she was a recognizable actress, having made a name for herself as a teen in films like Beetlejuice and Heathers. Still, she recalled, "I remember this feeling in your mind: You're negotiating, you're thinking about what's going to happen if you say something. You're working it out while this person is being extremely creepy."
Ryder added that she didn't realize just how jarring those moments were until she recently recounted them to her Beetlejuice Beetlejuice costar Jenna Ortega. "And as I was saying it, I was like, 'Jesus Christ, that's really f‑‑‑ed up,'" she said.
She eventually became accustomed to shutting down unwanted advances. "If someone was being inappropriate or drunkenly hitting on me it was like, 'Ha ha!' You kind of do that. 'Ha ha!'" she recalled. "Inappropriate? I dealt with that. But touching me? It felt very invasive."
The harassment took a serious toll on the actress and her perception of Hollywood. "I think in retrospect, it really soured [her on making movies]," she confessed. "All the great actors always told me that when it stops being amazing, you gotta get out. I really took that to heart."