Hayden Panettiere has recalled the horrifying moment a ‘well-respected Oscar winner’ exposed himself to her when she was aged just 19.
The Heroes actress, 36, who recently revealed she was placed in bed aged 18 with a ‘very famous undressed man’, said the ‘actor and director’ showed his genitals to her while she was at a private party, in a passage from memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning.
Panettiere said she was chatting with a group of men ‘in their forties and fifties’ at the party – which she attended with a friend – when she ‘sensed these men’s eyes on me and it made me uncomfortable.’
The star said she felt like a ‘young commodity ripe for the picking in that moment and decided to leave – when one of the men – described as an ‘Oscar winning actor and director’ approached her as she was putting on her coat.
Panettiere said the unidentified celebrity claimed to have a ‘big wad of gum on his pants’, writing: ‘I looked down and recoiled. This well-respected, award-winning actor’s testicles were hanging out from his unzipped fly.’
She fled the party without saying goodbye to her friend.
Hayden Panettiere has recalled the horrifying moment a ‘well respected Oscar winner’ exposed himself to her when she was aged just 19 – pictured 2022
The Heroes actress, 36, who recently revealed she was placed in bed aged 18 with a ‘very famous undressed man’ , said the ‘actor and director’ showed his genitals to her while she was at a private party, in a passage from memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning – pictured aged 19 in 2009
‘Up to that moment, men in Hollywood had always been kind and respectful around me. There may have been a peck on the lips here and an inappropriate comment there, but nothing had crossed a line’ she writes.
Panettiere said she did not tell her friend about the incident because she believed ‘the moment had passed’ and assumed ‘some older men had just grown up with no manners.’
The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for Hayden Panettiere for further comment.
The revelation comes after Panettiere fought back tears as she relived a traumatic experience which saw her put in bed with a ‘very famous man’ when she was aged just 18.
Panettiere who recently came out as bisexual, shocked fans as she revealed she was coerced into getting in bed with the ‘undressed’ older celebrity while aboard a boat.
The star further discussed the harrowing incident – which is chronicled in her memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning – on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast earlier this month admitting she realizes now how naive she was about the danger she was in.
Shetty said: ‘You write about a moment in your career where a friend of yours takes you onto a boat. You’re led to a room which has an older man in it and then basically told to perform sexual acts.’
Panettiere responded: ‘The fact that I was 18, even though I’d lived such a huge life and I thought I was oh so mature at 18… scientifically, your frontal lobes don’t develop until we’re what, 25, 26?
Panettiere said the unidentified celebrity claimed to have a ‘big wad of gum on his pants’, writing: ‘I looked down and recoiled. This well-respected, award-winning actor’s testicles were hanging out from his unzipped fly’ – pictured 2008 in Heroes
In a recent interview on the podcast On Purpose with Jay Shetty, Panettiere shared a traumatic experience which saw her put in bed with a ‘very famous man’ when she was aged just 18.
She shocked fans as she revealed she was coerced into getting in bed with the ‘undressed’ older celebrity and ‘told to perform sexual acts’ – pictured 2007 aged 18 in Heroes as Claire Bennet
‘So even though I felt like I could make healthy decisions, safe decisions, I wasn’t capable of being fully aware of what was going on around me.’
Panettiere claims the person who led her into the shocking situation was a friend who she trusted and saw as a ‘protector’ before they ‘physically put me in the bed next to this undressed man who was very famous.’
The actress said she was led downstairs into a small room before being put in bed with the unidentified man, who she says behaved ‘like this was just an average day for him.’
Nashville star Panettiere said she immediately became ‘ferocious’, adding: ‘That lion in me, that fire in me… my hair stood on end…
‘I was like, “This is not happening”‘ before running out of the room and trying to hide.
‘There was no jumping off and swimming away,’ she said. ‘And there was nobody who was going to be empathetic to my situation. I realized that this was nothing new to them.’
Panettiere shot to fame in 2006 aged 17 playing Claire Bennet – a high-school cheerleader who can spontaneously regenerate – on Heroes.
