(13 May 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Paris – 13 May 2025
1. Exterior of courtroom
2. SOUNDBITE (French) Carine Durrieu Diebolt, plaintiff’s lawyer with 54-year-old plaintiff, a set dresser, standing to her left
“It’s a fine decision, it’s recognition for the victims today, for Depardieu’s victims. It’s a victory for two women, two women on a film set, but it’s a victory for all the women beyond this trial."
3. Cutaway courtroom exterior
4. SOUNDBITE (French) Carine Durrieu Diebolt, plaintiff’s lawyer with 54-year-old plaintiff, a set dresser, standing to her left
"And also, today, as the Cannes Film Festival opens, I’d like the film world to spare a thought for Gérard Depardieu’s victims and some words for the victims of Gérard Depardieu, and to think of the victims."
5. SOUNDBITE (French) 54-year-old plaintiff:
"Listen, I’m very moved, and I’ve been more talkative than that. Today I’m finding it hard to express myself, I think everything has been said perfectly well by my lawyer."
6. Lawyer and plaintiff walking away
STORYLINE:
Gérard Depardieu was found guilty Tuesday of sexually assaulting two women on the set of a movie in which he starred in 2021 and given an 18-month suspended prison sentence.
The actor, 76, was also fined a total of 29,040 euros (around $32,350), and the court requested that he be registered in the national sex offender database.
He was convicted of having groped a 54-year-old set dresser and a 34-year-old assistant during the filming of “Les Volets Verts” (“The Green Shutters”).
The case was widely seen as a key post-#MeToo test of how French society and its film industry address allegations of sexual misconduct involving prominent figures.
Depardieu, who has denied the accusations, didn’t attend the hearing in Paris. Depardieu’s lawyer said that his client would appeal the decision.
"It is the victory of two women, but it is the victory of all the women beyond this trial,” said Carine Durrieu-Diebolt, the set dresser’s lawyer. “Today, as the Cannes Film Festival opens, I’d like the film world to spare a thought for Gérard Depardieu’s victims."
Depardieu’s long and storied career — he told the court that he’s made more than 250 films — has turned him into a French movie giant.
He was Oscar-nominated in 1991 for his performance as the swordsman and poet Cyrano de Bergerac.
During the four-day trial in March, Depardieu rejected the accusations, saying he’s “not like that.”
He acknowledged that he had used vulgar and sexualized language on the film set and that he grabbed the set dresser’s hips during an argument, but denied that his behavior was sexual.
The set dresser described the alleged assault, saying the actor pincered her between his legs as she squeezed past him in a narrow corridor.
She said he grabbed her hips then started “palpating” her behind and “in front, around.” She ran her hands near her buttocks, hips and pubic area to show what she allegedly experienced. She said he then grabbed her chest.
The woman also testified that Depardieu used an obscene expression to ask her to touch his penis and suggested he wanted to rape her. She told the court that the actor’s calm and cooperative attitude during the trial bore no resemblance to his behavior at work.
The other plaintiff, an assistant, said that Depardieu groped her buttocks and her breasts during three separate incidents on the film set.
The Associated Press doesn’t identify by name people who say they were sexually assaulted unless they consent to be named. Neither women has done so in this case.
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