X-Men director Bryan Singer has been accused of drugging, manipulating, and forcibly sodomizing a then-17-year-old boy in a graphic new lawsuit filed yesterday. The suit further contends that Singer did these things as part of “a group of adult males similarly positioned in the entertainment industry that maintained and exploited boys in a sordid sex ring,” according to excerpts published in The Wrap. Implicated in the charges against Singer—and allegedly at the head of that ring—is Marc Collins-Rector, founder of the Internet startup Digital Entertainment Network and a convicted sex offender, who pled guilty in 2004 to luring minors across state lines for sex.
The lawsuit was filed in Hawaii, where attorneys for the plaintiff say some of the alleged events took place at the Oahu estate of hairdresser Paul Mitchell. They are seeking a jury trial and unspecified damages for battery, assault, emotional distress, and “invasion of privacy by unreasonable intrusion.” A press conference is expected later today.
Singer’s accuser, Michael Egan, was a model and aspiring actor who says he first met Collins-Rector in 1998, when he attended parties at what was known as the “M&C Estate”—a mansion that Collins-Rector and his DEN partner Chad Shackley had purchased from hip-hop mogul Suge Knight, which soon became notorious as a place where a “who’s who of gay Hollywood” partied. Egan alleges that during one of those parties, he was introduced to Singer, who told him that the men he saw there “controlled Hollywood,” and that keeping them happy was the key to his fulfilling his career ambitions.
Over the years, numerous lawsuits have been filed by others alleging they were raped and coerced into performing sexual acts on the men of the M&C Estate—lawsuits that eventually led to Collins-Rector and his partners fleeing to Spain in 2002. Upon being extradited back to the U.S., Collins-Rector pled guilty to eight charges of child enticement and registered as a sex offender. He was also hit with a $4.5 million summary judgment in civil court. All of the accusations against him—and everyone who’d partied at his house—were well-documented in a 2007 exposé by Radar.
Filed nearly a decade after them, Egan’s own accusations recall those earlier charges almost exactly, alleging that the men there threatened the safety of his family, forced him to drink, drugged him without his knowledge, and repeatedly sexually assaulted him.
Here are some of the more graphic details, which will now be seared into your brain on this fine spring morning:
Approximately 2-3 months after Collins-Rector began sexually abusing Plaintiff, Defendant Singer was socializing with Collins-Rector around the estate’s swimming pool and Plaintiff was in the pool. In compliance with the “rules” imposed by Collins-Rector that people in the pool area were not allowed to wear clothes, Plaintiff was nude as was Defendant Singer.
Collins-Rector ordered Plaintiff out of the pool, and Defendant Singer hugged Plaintiff and grabbed his bare buttocks. They then went to the jacuzzi where Collins-Rector had Plaintiff sit on his lap and fondled Plaintiff’s genitals. Collins-Rector then passed Plaintiff to Defendant Singer and Plaintiff was made to sit on Defendant Singer’s lap.
Defendant Singer provided an alcoholic beverage to Plaintiff and mentioned finding a role for him in an upcoming movie that he was directing. Defendant Singer told Plaintiff how “this group” controls Hollywood, and that he was sexy. Defendant Singer masturbated Plaintiff and then performed oral sex upon him. Defendant Singer solicited Plaintiff to perform oral sex upon him which Plaintiff resisted.
Defendant Singer flagrantly disregarded Plaintiff’s unwillingness to submit, and forced Plaintiff’s head underwater to make Plaintiff perform oral sex upon him. When Plaintiff pulled his head out of the water in order to breathe, Defendant Singer demanded that he continue which Plaintiff refused. Defendant Singer then forced Plaintiff to continue performing oral sex upon him outside of the pool, and subsequently forcibly sodomized Plaintiff.
As to why Egan would continue to attend these parties or put up with these repeated assaults, the lawsuit alleges that Collins-Rector held a gun against Egan’s head and said he would shoot if Egan continued to resist sexual contact. Egan claims he was so intimidated, he even agreed to fly with Singer to Hawaii, where he alleges the director kept him in line by alternating between threats to “report [his] refusals” to Collins-Rector, and making Egan promises to land him roles in an unspecified “X-Men movie,” as well as various other productions. Egan further claims that Singer forced “a handful of cocaine” into his face, drugged his drink with something that impaired his motor skills, then anally raped him. Twice.
Here, have some more images:
During the first of the above-referenced trips to Hawaii, Plaintiff was instructed that he would spend the first two nights in a room with Defendant Singer. During the first night, Plaintiff took a long walk by himself. When he returned to the Paul Mitchell estate, he came across Defendant Singer who was in the pool area. Defendant Singer verbally and loudly confronted Plaintiff for not having been available for him earlier and demanded that he undress.
Defendant Singer frightened Plaintiff by pushing him into the pool, and rebuked Plaintiff for his attitude and reminded him that he was there to keep people happy. Defendant Singer put a handful of cocaine against Plaintiff’s nose and forced him to inhale it. Defendant Singer then provided Plaintiff with a beverage which he drank which significantly impacted his consciousness and his motor skills.
Defendant Singer then entered the pool where he nonconsensually masturbated Plaintiff and performed oral sex upon him. Defendant Singer caused Plaintiff to rub his erect penis against Defendant Singer’s buttocks. He forced Plaintiff’s head underwater and made Plaintiff orally copulate him. He then caused Plaintiff to get out of the pool and lie face down on a lounge chair. To continue the sexual assault, Defendant Singer spit on Plaintiff’s buttocks, spanked him, and forced a handful of cocaine onto Plaintiff’s face.
He then anally raped Plaintiff. He subsequently caused them to go to the jacuzzi where he provided another beverage to Plaintiff. Defendant Singer attempted to insert his penis into Plaintiff’s mouth which Plaintiff resisted, but he ultimately was able to force his penis into Plaintiff’s mouth. Defendant Singer then assisted Plaintiff to their room where he again anally raped Plaintiff.
According to Singer’s attorneys, the timing of the lawsuit—filed just weeks before the release of X-Men: Days Of Future Past—is far from a coincidence. Dismissing the case as “absurd and defamatory” in a statement, Singer’s attorney Martin Singer said, “It is obvious that this case was filed in an attempt to get publicity at the time when Bryan’ s new movie is about to open in a few weeks.”
Certainly contributing to that publicity, the suit was announced in a press release blast that was sent out by a phalanx of attorneys led by Jeff Herman, identified in the announcement as “a nationally recognized attorney for victims of sexual abuse.” Most famously, Herman represented the five men who accused Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash of similar charges of sexual assault. In his statement, Herman declared, “Hollywood has a problem with the sexual exploitation of children,” and called these accusations against Singer just “the first of many cases” he intends to bring against others involved in the entertainment industry’s “sordid sex ring.”
While most of the charges against Clash were eventually dismissed, whether due to the statute of limitations or dropped voluntarily, the scandal surrounding them was enough that Clash was forced to resign from Sesame Street. Even now, it remains an indelible association. And while Singer managed to overcome a similar 1997 lawsuit alleging he’d forced teenage boys to strip naked for a scene in Apt Pupil, no matter what comes of these new charges, the graphic nature of them and the spectacle surrounding them certainly seem designed to stick—at a time when Singer has not only the future of the X-Men franchise in his hands, but plenty of other high-profile projects in the works, such as Vince Gilligan’s Battle Creek for CBS. Singer has yet to comment.