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Topics: Elliot Page, Mental Health, Books, Celebrity, Film and TV
The UNILAD Team
Topics: Elliot Page, Mental Health, Books, Celebrity, Film and TV
**Warning: Contains descriptions of sexual assault.**
Elliot Page has spoken out about an incident of alleged sexual assault he experienced on the set of Hard Candy.
Page was 16 years old when he worked on 2005 release Hard Candy - a psychological thriller centred on a 14-year-old vigilante trapping and torturing a man she believes to be a sexual predator.
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The now-36-year-old actor - who publicly came out as transgender in 2020 - has since spoken out about his 'traumatic' experience with a member of the production team working on Hard Candy in his recently released memoir, Pageboy.
Page explains he was offered a lift home from a man within the film's production team, however, when they arrived at his house, the man allegedly forced himself on Page.
The book recounts: "His voice sweet, his hands on my shoulders, he guided me to the bedroom.
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"I went stiff. Unsure what to do as he stood tall and removed his glasses.
"He laid me down on the bed."
According to Page, the man then told him he wanted to perform oral sex on him, before proceeding to do so.
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"I froze," Page recalls. "After it was over, he tried to stay in the bed with me. I had thawed marginally and told him he couldn’t, to get out."
According to the actor, this isn't the first time he's had such an experience with a member of a production team within the film and television industry before either.
Page claims he was once standing in an empty living room in front of the couch when he felt himself being 'grab[bed]' by a woman on a production team when he was working on another job.
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He writes: "She pressed her face into mine, some version of kissing.
"That freezing coming over me again. The next thing I knew I was on the rug, the floor firm on my back. I didn’t say no, I did not resist, I just stiffened."
In an interview with The Guardian, Page explains that he 'didn't know how to talk to people about' what happened to him.
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"It took me a long time to be able to sit and fully talk about these experiences or acknowledge that they were traumatic and had a significant impact on me.
"I’d sit in therapy and talk about these things, and my therapist would go: ‘That’s a lot, that’s traumatic,’ and I’d be like: ‘What? What are you talking about?’ I don’t know if that was a self-defence mechanism or just being made to feel it’s not a big deal."
Page reflects on the two alleged incidents: "Apart from the power conversation and the toxicity that comes with that, it is just being a young person who’s in a space with lots of adults and in situations where people took … I don’t even know the word. I was about to say ‘advantage’ or ‘awful advantage’, but that just feels gross.
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"I almost don’t have the words for it because it’s so f**king hard to wrap my head around why somebody wants to do that to some[one]."
UNILAD has contacted Vulcan Productions and Launchpad Productions for comment.
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
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this article and wish to speak to someone in confidence, contact the Rape Crisis England and Wales helpline on 0808 802 9999 between 12pm–2.30pm and 7pm– 9.30pm every day. Alternatively, you can contact Victim Support free on 08 08 16 89 111 available 24/7, every day of the year, including Christmas