Megan responded to claims director Michael Bay made her wash his car in a bikini for an audition. Photo / Instagram
Megan responded to claims director Michael Bay made her wash his car in a bikini for an audition. Photo / Instagram
Megan Fox has responded to the online uproar that erupted this week over a resurfaced talk show interview from 2009.
In the clip, Fox told talk show host Jimmy Kimmel about one of her earliest experiences working for Transformers director Michael Bay. She claimed the director ordered her to dance in a bikini under a waterfall on the set of Bad Boys II, when she was just 15 years old.
As the clip circulated again this week, fans flooded social media with messages of support for Fox, whose career fortunes slid after she complained about working with Bay.
But in a lengthy statement posted to her Instagram, Fox thanked fans for their support while objecting to the "sinister shadow" that had been cast over her experiences.
"I know that a discussion has erupted online surrounding some of my experiences in Hollywood and the subsequent mishandling of this information by the media and society in general," Fox began.
"While I greatly appreciate the outpouring of support, I do feel I need to clarify some of the details as they have been lost in the retelling of the events and cast a sinister shadow that doesn't really, in my opinion, belong. At least not where it's currently being projected…"
Fox noted that while she was "around 15 or 16" when she was an extra in Bad Boys II, another story about her allegedly having to audition for Transformers by washing Bay's car happened a few years later and had been incorrectly reported.
"It's important to note however that when I auditioned for Transformers I was 19 or 20. I did 'work' (me pretending to know how to hold a wrench) on one of Michael's Ferraris during one of the audition scenes. It was at the Platinum Dunes studio parking lot, there were several other crew members and employees present and I was at no point undressed or anything similar. So as far as this particular audition story I was not underage at the time and I was not made to 'wash' or work on someone's cars in a way that was extraneous from the material in the actual script. I hope that whatever opinions are formed around these episodes will at least be seeded in the facts of the events."
Fox again thanked fans for their support, but also said that the incidents that have caused much outrage this week were, to her, "inconsequential in a long and arduous journey along which I have endured some genuinely harrowing experiences in a ruthlessly misogynistic industry".
Megan responded to claims director Michael Bay made her wash his car in a bikini for an audition. Photo / Instagram
Fox finished her statement by saying that "when it comes to my direct experiences with Michael, and Steven (Spielberg) for that matter, I was never assaulted or preyed upon in what I felt was a sexual manner. I'm thankful to all of you who are brave enough to speak out and I'm grateful to all of you who are taking it upon yourselves to support, uplift, and bring comfort to those who have been harmed by a violent and toxic societal paradigm."
In a 2018 interview, Fox addressed her experiences in Hollywood before the advent of the #MeToo movement, and suggested her accounts of her experiences were not always taken seriously.
"My words were taken and used against me in a way that was – at that time in my life, at that age and dealing with that level of fame – really painful," she told The New York Times.
"I don't want to say this about myself, but let's say that I was ahead of my time and so people weren't able to understand. Instead, I was rejected because of qualities that are now being praised in other women coming forward.
"And because of my experience, I feel it's likely that I will always be just out of the collective understanding. I don't know if there will ever be a time where I'm considered normal or relatable or likeable.
"Even with the #MeToo movement, and everyone coming out with stories – and one could assume that I probably have quite a few stories, and I do – I didn't speak out for many reasons.
"I just didn't think based on how I'd been received by people, and by feminists, that I would be a sympathetic victim."
In recent years, Fox's on-screen roles have been more sporadic as she's raised three children with husband Brian Austin Green. But the pair last month revealed they were separating after 10 years of marriage, and Fox is now dating rapper Machine Gun Kelly.
