There's a lot the world knows about Brooke Shields' life, but this incident is one she's addressing on her own terms.
In her upcoming documentary, Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields, the supermodel and actress shares she was sexually assaulted in her twenties by a Hollywood executive, according to People and other reports.
"No one is going to believe me," she thought, per People. "People weren't believing those stories back then. I thought I would never work again."
The assault took place during what Shields called the "lowest point" of her career following her Princeton University graduation. "I thought I was getting a movie, a job," she said of the dinner she had with the unnamed executive. However, he assaulted her in his hotel room, where he had invited Shields to call for a cab. The now-57-year-old star recalled freezing in the moment and blaming herself afterward.
"I kept saying, 'I shouldn't have done that. Why did I go up with him? I shouldn't have had that drink at dinner,'" she said, per People.
Shields explained she disassociated from the incident. "Fight was not an option, so you just leave your body," she said. "'You're not there. It didn't happen.'"
"I'd always had a sense of disassociation from my body. From my sexuality," she noted.
"I was mostly a cover girl, so it's all here," added Shields, referencing her neck up. "And it was just easier to shut myself off. I was good at it."
According to a previous Entertainment Weekly report following the film's premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, Shields occupied herself watching volleyball players out the window with a pair of binoculars left in the hotel room after the executive disappeared "for awhile."
"The door opens, the person comes out naked, and I've got the binoculars and I'm like, 'S---,'" she described. "And I put the binoculars down and he's right on me. Just like, was wrestling."
As Shields recalled, "I was afraid I'd get choked out or something... So I didn't fight that much. I didn't. I just absolutely froze. I thought one 'No' should've been enough, and I just thought, 'Stay alive and get out,' and I just shut it out."
"I went down in the elevator, and I got my own cab," she described. "I just cried all the way to my friend's apartment."
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