'I have seen men cry like Kavanaugh': Ellen Barkin says Brett Kavanaugh's testimony reminded her of the words of her own rapist

Ellen Barkin says hearing Brett Kavanaugh’s testimony on Thursday gave her flashbacks to her own sexual assault. (Photos: Getty Images)
Ellen Barkin says hearing Brett Kavanaugh’s testimony on Thursday gave her flashbacks to her own sexual assault. (Photos: Getty Images)

Ellen Barkin had a deeply personal connection to Brett Kavanaugh’s testimony on Thursday. It reminded her of the behavior of her own rapist.

The Animal Kingdom actress and self-proclaimed badass isn’t known for holding back, so she didn’t while watching the Supreme Court nominee’s at times fiery and at other times weepy rebuttal to Christine Blasey Ford recounting her allegations of sexual assault. Barkin, 64, posted a series of tweets, many using the hashtag #MeToo, while watching it unfold, including this one — in which she compares Kavanaugh’s tears to the tears of her own attacker — which has gotten some attention.

“I have seen men cry like Kavanaugh, the one who cried at my feet after smashing my face thru a glass coffee table,” wrote Barkin. One commenter — who identified themselves only as USASTRONGAGAIN — called the Sea of Love and Ocean’s Thirteen star a load of names (like “idiot” and “clueless”) and questioned her about the attack. In her reply, Barkin said that during the attack, which took place “43 yrs ago,” making her about 21 years old, she was “repeatedly raped for 5 hours.”

She also noted that she did report it to the New York Police Department, and posted another tweet regarding what she was told by police in 1975.

Barkin posted several other tweets expressing her not-so-subtle opinions about Kavanaugh’s emotional testimony.

She also had harsh words for Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, whose finger-pointing rant about being a “single white man” who “will not shut up” was also criticized.

Barkin — who has said, “If being a badass is being a person who doesn’t take s*** from anyone, then yes, that would be me” — has been a voice during this time of #MeToo and #TimesUp. In March, when director Terry Gilliam, whom she worked with in 1998’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, criticized the #MeToo movement, she had this brow-raising reply:

In another tweet in 2017, Barkin writes, “Why couldn’t you keep your mouth shut and stay gone,” and reacting to Gilliam criticizing the #MeToo movement as “simplistic” and “silly,” she wrote, “terry gilliam is the last man to admonish a movement that is trying to protect women from abusive men. #MeToo.”

Barkin was one of the early actors to go on the record about disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s improper workplace behavior. While she was never a victim of his sexual advances, she said in an Oct. 27 New Yorker story that Weinstein frequently verbally abused her, calling her a “c***” and “c*** bitch” while filming Into the West, which he produced. The “repercussions are real,” if people dared to take him on, she said. “I was terrified Harvey was going to make it impossible to go back to work, with those tentacles of his.” She added, “This fear of losing your career is not losing your ticket to a borrowed dress and earrings someone paid you to wear. It’s losing your ability to support yourself, to support your family, and this is f***ing real whether you are the biggest movie star or the lowest-pay-grade assistant.”

While so many Hollywood stars have come forward over the last year to speak out about mistreatment, Barkin said in another interview in June that she doesn’t see things changing that much for women in the industry. “Not in my lifetime anyway,” she told InStyle. “We’re talking about centuries of ingrained behavior, and considering we are an industry that trades on sex, I don’t ever expect to see any other real dynamic.”


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