Reese Witherspoon, Jennifer Lawrence Share Sexual Assault, Harassment Stories

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Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Lawrence are adding their voices to the growing list of major Hollywood stars who are coming forward with their stories of sexual harassment and sexual assault within the industry.

On Monday, both Witherspoon and Lawrence got candid about their respective experiences as young acting hopefuls at the Elle Women in Hollywood event, noting that they were encouraged at the time to keep quiet about their encounters.

"When I was much younger and starting out, I was told by the producers of a film to lose 15 pounds in two weeks," Lawrence said at the podium, where she was accepting the magazine's cover honor. "One girl before me had already been fired for not losing enough weight fast enough, and during this time a female producer had me do a nude lineup with about five women who were much, much thinner than me. And we all stood side by side with only paste-ons covering our privates."

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Fellow Oscar winner Witherspoon, for her part, revealed that she had been sexually assaulted by a director when she was just 16 years old – and that the recent headlines surrounding Harvey Weinstein’s inappropriate behavior had brought those memories back.

"I have my own experiences that have come back to me very vividly and I find it really hard to sleep, hard to think, hard to communicate a lot of the feelings that I’ve been having about anxiety, honest, the guilt for not speaking up earlier," she said. "[I feel] true disgust at the director who assaulted me when I was 16 years old and anger at the agents and the producers who made me feel that silence was a condition of my employment. And I wish that I could tell you that was an isolated incident in my career, but sadly it wasn't. I've had multiple experiences of harassment and sexual assault and I don't speak about them very often."

http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/news/reese-witherspoon-jennifer-lawrence-on-assault-harassment-w509275