Rose McGowan accuses Alexander Payne of raping her when she was 15 in a second ‘bomb of truth’ Instagram post – one day after claiming he showed her porn movie as a teen

‘I now know I was groomed’: Rose McGowan accuses Oscar-winning director Alexander Payne of raping her when she was 15 in a second ‘bomb of truth’ Instagram post – one day after claiming he showed her a soft-core porn movie as a teen

Rose McGowan last night accused Oscar-winning director Alexander Payne of ‘grooming’ her and having sex with her when she was 15.

The actress, now 46, said that ‘for years I had thought a man I had sexual relations with was a a sexual experience I had… I now know I was groomed.’  

Payne has yet to comment on the allegations. 

McGowan – a pioneer of the #MeToo movement who was one of the first women to come forward against Harvey Weinstein – said the alleged ordeal led her to quit acting before she returned to Hollywood after being ‘discovered’ at age 21.   

Earlier on Monday she had named Payne as the ‘well-endowed’ man who allegedly ‘sat me down and played a soft-core porn movie’ when she was 15 – an incident she first described in 2018 without identifying Payne. 

‘If you are out there trying to have sex with an underage minor, you are committing a crime, even if the minor doesn’t know it,’ she said last night in a second ‘bomb of truth’ post on Instagram. 

‘I was attracted to him, so I thought it was on me, but that’s not correct. I was not an adult.’  

Rose McGowan (pictured left) last night accused Hollywood director Alexander Payne (right) of having ‘groomed’ her when she was 15

McGowan made her allegations against Payne in a second ‘bomb of truth’ Instagram post on Monday night, having earlier named him on Twitter 

McGowan had made her first allegation on Twitter on Monday morning, asking for an ‘acknowledgement and an apology’ from the director. 

‘Alexander Payne. You sat me down and played a soft-core porn movie you directed for Showtime under a different name,’ she said. 

‘I still remember your apartment in Silverlake. You are very well-endowed. You left me on a street corner afterwards. I was 15.’

She also tweeted a picture of herself at age 15, saying: ‘I just want an acknowledgement and an apology. I do not want to destroy.’ 

Last night, McGowan followed up with a longer Instagram post in which she described the alleged ‘grooming’.  

‘For years I had thought a man I had sexual relations with was a a sexual experience I had. I now know I was groomed,’ she said. 

‘I auditioned for him at 15. After my experience with him, I quit acting entirely until I was ‘discovered’ at 21. 

‘When that happened, I was like, f*** it, let’s do this. I even tweeted a congratulations on his Oscar win in 2012, that’s how deep in the Cult of Hollywood I was. 

‘It wasn’t until three weeks after the Weinstein story broke that I re-evaluated the situation.’

She continued: ‘I feel badly about throwing a bomb into someone’s life and career, but I guess that’s social conditioning.

‘I’m more sad than angry. Sad for 15 year-old me. Sad for the adult me that still thought it was a choice I made. 

‘Grooming is real. I want you all to know that it’s not your fault if you were mentally massaged into thinking it’s okay. It is not. I know this now. 

‘I would even go up to this director at events and ask him, with a smile, “remember when you had sex with me at 15?” And I would laugh it off. That is deep societal programming. 

‘When it happened, I’d recently been left behind in Hollywood by a family member to fend for myself. The wolves preyed. 

‘Please recognize that if this has happened to you, the shame is not yours, it’s theirs. Give it back. Groomers are skilled operators and at 15, I was not aware of the warning signs.’

She concluded: ‘Goddess bless us all, except for those that abuse their power. Here’s to freedom, yours and mine.’   

The actress, 46, took to Twitter on Monday to make allegations that the Oscar-winning director, 59, was ‘very well-endowed’ and had ‘left her on a street corner’ after showing her the pornographic material

McGowan then posted a black and white headshot of herself as a teenager, adding: ‘I just want an acknowledgement and an apology. I do not want to destroy. This was me at 15.’

Payne, now 59, was 28 at the time of the alleged sexual encounters in the late 1980s. 

He subsequently rose to fame for movies such as Sideways (2004), Election (1999) and About Schmidt (2002). 

McGowan was an early face of the #MeToo movement in the fall of 2017 after she accused Harvey Weinstein of raping her. 

In January 2018, she gave some details of the Payne allegation – but without identifying the director by name. 

Speaking to Ronan Farrow, she said she had been the victim of a man who ‘picked me up when I was 15 years old’. 

‘He took he home after he met me and he showed me a soft-porn movie he’d made for Showtime under a different name,’ she said at the time. 

‘And then he had sex with me and then he left me next to Cafe Tropicale in Silverlake standing on a street corner.’ 

McGowan hinted at the time that she would reveal the director’s name when she was ready, having previously given the name to Farrow.   

Rose McGowan, left, has called for an ‘acknowledgement and apology’ from director Alexander Payne, right, after claiming he played her a ‘soft-core porn movie’ when she was  15

In May, McGowan said that she is ‘in a good place now’ that Weinstein is serving a 23-year prison sentence for rape and sexual assault.   

The disgraced movie mogul, 68, was convicted in March in a landmark #MeToo case that ended with six of his accusers sobbing and hugging each other from the front row of the courtroom. 

Speaking at all-female members club, the AllBright’s digital event series for Mental Health Awareness Week, the Charmed star said: ‘I’m in a good place now because nine/ten weeks ago he was put in prison.

‘Although I hear he’s in the hospital because he’s too scared to be in general population. He’s always faking something.’  

Weinstein was hospitalized with chest pains hours after receiving a 23-year sentence. 

Later in March, he tested positive for Covid-19 and was put in isolation for 14-days at Wende Correctional Facility in Western New York.  

Weinstein was convicted of raping an aspiring actress in 2013 and forcibly performing oral sex on a TV and film production assistant in 2006.    

McGowan went on to share that creativity has been her ‘antidote’ to her past trauma and claimed that she had a nervous breakdown ‘during the whole thing’.

The American actress continued: ‘I wrote the book Brave and recorded Planet 9 simultaneously; they go together… 

#MeToo movement: McGowan, 46, who was one of the leading activists of the global movement and accused Harvey Weinstein of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s, has now shared that she is ‘in a good place’ following his conviction (pictured together in 2007) 

‘I had this incredible workload for three-and-a-half years, and I did that because I knew that after I was done fighting the bad guys and bad women (if you’re ever done), that I would have no Hollywood career. 

‘Planet 9 is the happy reward for going through Brave because Brave is tough at times… it’s a book that gets you brave but you have to go through a lot with me to get there.’

McGowan released her music album, Planet 9, in April where she whispers songs to soothe people and her memoir Brave, which documents Weinstein’s sexual assault, in 2018.    

The star added: ‘I’ll be honest, I think at one point during the whole thing, I think I had now what I know to be a nervous breakdown, and I didn’t know, I don’t know who could of survived it…

‘They drive us to die, and they drive us to commit suicide, and that’s what they were trying to do and my brain at one point just snapped under the pressure.’

Convicted: The disgraced movie mogul, 68, was convicted in March in a landmark #MeToo case that ended with six of his accusers sobbing and hugging each other from the front row of the courtroom (pictured outside court on February 24) 

McGowan added that she was ‘working toward steadily taking [Weinstein] down for years’ and became used to ‘being hated’ after becoming a polarising figure.

She said: ‘Sometimes I just think I’m a freak. I’ve always been the same… but when I shaved my head, people could hear the words coming out of my mouth. I knew what I was setting up, I was working toward steadily taking [Weinstein] down for years. 

‘And again, that’s why I created Brave and Planet 9 – I had to write my way out of Hollywood which I call a cult because I grew up in one and I would know.’

McGowan claimed that Weinstein ‘paid’ people to trash her and ‘disregard me as a drug addict, a crazy woman, a w***e’.

She continued: ‘The standard playbook that they do for anybody that comes forward about sexual assault, whether they’re known or unknown. But then the sad thing is when people join in; when people believe it.   

‘I was so used to being hated in a way, for so long that I was like – well I might as well give you a reason to hate me. And I might as well help a lot of people while I can. Rose McGowen speaks out about Harvey Weinstein’s upcoming trialLoaded: 0%Progress: 0%0:00PreviousPlaySkipMuteCurrent Time0:00/Duration Time0:22FullscreenNeed Text

‘Because I do have a special weird superpower. I don’t know what it is by name, but I can cut through the noise and I do it effectively.’

McGowan concluded her interview by revealing that she feels ‘safer’ during lockdown, she said: ‘I feel safer because people can’t get to me for once.’

The star joined The AllBright Group and Let’s Reset as part of their digital event series for Mental Health Awareness Week.  

McGowan has previously claimed that she forwent having children so she could ‘keep on fighting’ against Weinstein and insisted she won’t be free of the disgraced mogul until one of them is dead. 

In an interview with The Guardian, she told that her battle against the producer has been ‘very calculated’, but insisted it will not be over until ‘he’s dead – or I am’.

‘If I had had a child, I couldn’t have taken Harvey Weinstein down, said Rose, ‘So I had to forego that so I could keep on fighting. I had to basically have no dependants. It’s been very calculated.’

She added: ‘I probably am not going to be free of him until he’s dead or I’m dead’.  

She told that the years prior to his conviction felt like her ‘cells were dissolving’, because she was constantly working at a ‘high anxiety level’.   

McGowan told GMB the guilty verdicts were a ‘huge moment’ and that she hoped it would lead to more predators being convicted. Rose McGowan talks about ‘Me Too’ movement on GQ red carpet

McGowan said: ‘This is a huge victory for all of us who have ever been affected by Harvey Weinstein. This affects so many. It’s a huge moment. I thought he was going to exonerated.’ 

‘I never really had hope you see. I realized the last time I had hope was the moment before I was raped by him and after that it became survival.   

‘I didn’t have hope but not because of the jury, I’m very grateful to that jury for getting further than most jury’s get in rape cases. 

‘I was worried, it’s hard to speak publicly about it without getting sued. But it’s an extraordinary moment and it’s a watershed moment.

‘It’s a never-ending kind of situation. This is an unbelievable achievement to have a woman who was raped by an accuser in court and saying ”you did this to me”. That is a privilege. There’s an astounding number of victims who never get any kind of measure of justice. 

‘So, I found it, we were winning by even having it in court. That’s how little we’ve been taught to expect.’

Speaking out: Speaking at all-female members club, the AllBright’s digital event series for Mental Health Awareness Week, the Charmed star said: ‘I’m in a good place now because nine/ten weeks ago he was put in prison.’ (pictured in October 2019)