Borat 2 Producer Says Rudy Giuliani Tried To Get Movie’s Crew Arrested Over Infamous Scene

SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Rudy Giuliani

Rudy Giuliani tried to get the film crew of Borat Subsequent Moviefilm arrested after that controversial scene, according to the sequel's producers.

Speaking at a Producers Guild of America panel over the weekend, producer Monica Levinson said that the former New York City mayor reached out to local law enforcement after the cameras stopped rolling, as reported by Deadline.

Giuliani did not immediately respond to PEOPLE's request for comment.

In the infamous scene, Oscar nominee Maria Bakalova, who plays Borat's teenage daughter, poses as a journalist interviewing Giuliani, 76. After their interview, Bakalova invites the politician into a hotel bedroom for a drink, and Giuliani is then seen leaning back onto a bed and appears to put his hand down the front of his pants. Giuliani has called the clip a "complete fabrication" and denied any inappropriate behavior.

"He claimed we were trying to extort him at the time, which we didn't ask for anything," Levinson said at the PGA panel. "He called all of his New York City cops and said extortion, which was a federal crime."

RELATED: Borat Sequel's Maria Bakalova Speaks Out on Infamous Scene with Rudy Giuliani

To make matters more stressful, the hotel locked the crew out of the suite where they had filmed the scene, per the producer.

Fortunately, they had already gotten the footage in question out of the room. "That's always out first," said Levinson. "We would hide tapes in our pants."

"We ended up confabbing with our lawyers," added the producer, who spent 19 hours in jail while shooting the first Borat film. "I called the production team and said, 'Let's get everyone to New Jersey tonight.' It was 11 o'clock at night. I didn't want a repeat of what happened to me on the first movie happening to the entire crew."

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Amazon Studios Maria Bakalova and Sacha Baron Cohen in Borat Subsequent Moviefilm

As for her experience filming the scene, Bakalova has admitted that it " was nerve-racking."

"I do have to admit that I prepared myself really hard to know every single detail about his life and be his biggest fan," the Bulgarian actress, who has received a number of nominations for her role in the film, said during a recent appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.

"For me, who isn't an American person, It wasn't about the political situation, it was more about again, how we treat each other," she said. "It's not even about how old he is, what is his position, it's about how he treated me. And I'm thinking about, would he have behaved the same way if I was a man journalist, would he have been coming with me to the bedroom, or drinking or laughing this way. I don't know, those kind of questions."