Woody Allen at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. Image by Getty Images

By Aiden Pink October 15, 2017

Woody Allen has said that the sexual assault allegations about Harvey Weinstein are “very sad for everybody involved,” but warned against a “witch hunt.”

The accusations against Weinstein are “tragic for the poor women that were involved, sad for Harvey that his life is so messed up,” Allen told the BBC. “There’s no winners in that, it’s just very, very sad and tragic for those poor women that had to go through that.”

Allen claimed that he had never heard any stories about inappropriate behavior by Weinstein, who produced many of his films. “But you do hear a million fanciful rumors all the time,” Allen said. “And some turn out to be true and some — many — are just stories about this actress, or that actor.”

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Allen also warned against people jumping to conclusions about inappropriate sexual relations.

“You don’t want it to lead to a witch-hunt atmosphere, a Salem atmosphere, where every guy in an office who winks at a woman is suddenly having to call a lawyer to defend himself,” he said. “That’s not right either. But sure, you hope that something like this could be transformed into a benefit for people rather than just a sad or tragic situation.”

One of the journalists who broke the Weinstein story, Ronan Farrow, is Woody Allen’s estranged son. Farrow has accused Allen of sexually assaulting Dylan Farrow, Allen’s daughter, when Dylan was seven years old. Allen denied the allegations.

Contact Aiden Pink at [email protected] or on Twitter, @aidenpink

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