Arnold Schwarzenegger apologises for past groping in new Netflix documentary
Arnold Schwarzenegger has apologised for inappropriately sexually touching and 'humiliating' women.
Upcoming three-part Netflix docuseries Arnold dives into the 75-year-old actor's 'multifaceted life and career, from bodybuilding champ to Hollywood icon to politician'.
However, as well as documenting the highs of his life, the series also investigates the lows, such as the actor's affair and love child with his housekeeper and the groping scandal which followed Schwarzenegger in the lead-up to the 2003 California governor elections.
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The allegations arose prior to Schwarzenegger's four-day tour ahead of the election results.
Six women came forward - via a report put together by the Los Angeles Times published on 2 October, 2003 - claiming the actor had groped them.
Three said the actor-turned-politician grabbed their breasts, one said he reached under her skirt and a fifth said she was in a hotel lift with Schwarzenegger when he tried to remove her swimsuit.
The final woman - British TV presenter and journalist Anna Richardson - told the LA Times Schwarzenegger grabbed her 'on to his knee and said, "Before you go, I want to know if your breasts are real.'"
"At that point, he circled my left nipple with his finger and he said, 'Yes, they are real,'" she said.
At the time, Schwarzenegger admitted he 'offended people' by 'behaving badly' on some 'rowdy' film sets.
"I have done things that were not right which I thought then was playful. A lot of the stuff in the story is not true [...] but I have to say that where there's smoke there's fire," he said.
He'd previously dismissed rumours about his behaviour towards women by saying 'a lot of crazy things happened in the '70s'.
Six women turned into 15 women and three decades later, Schwarzenegger has fully reflected on his behaviour.
In a preview clip from Netflix docuseries Arnold, the actor admits his reaction to the groping allegations 'in the beginning' was 'kind of defensive'.
Schwarzenegger continues: "Today, I can look at it and kind of say, it doesn’t really matter what time it is. If it’s the Muscle Beach days of forty years ago, or today, that this was wrong.
"It was bulls**t. Forget all the excuses, it was wrong."
Despite his lack of a full apology at the time, Schwarzenegger still won the 2003 California state elections by a whopping one million votes.
Only Richardson went on to take legal action against Schwarzenegger - with four of the women remaining anonymous. Richardson's lawsuit was settled out of court in 2006.
The LA Times quotes one of the alleged victims of Schwarzenegger's groping as saying: "What could you do? He was the highest-paid actor in the world."
Arnold is set for release on Netflix tomorrow (Wednesday, 7 June).
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this article and wish to speak to someone in confidence, contact The Survivor’s Trust for free on 08088 010 818, or through their website thesurvivorstrust.org
Topics: Arnold Schwarzenegger, TV and Film, Netflix, Mental Health, Celebrity
Poppy Bilderbeck