French actor Gerard Depardieu has been found guilty of sexually assaulting two women on a film set.
Depardieu was convicted of groping a 54-year-old set dresser and a 34-year-old assistant director during the filming of Les Volets Verts (The Green Shutters) in 2021. The 76-year-old was handed an 18-month suspended sentence in a Paris court on Tuesday, a term requested by the prosecution during the trial, and fined €29,040 (£24,420). The court also called for Depardieu to be registered in the national sex offender database.
One of the victims, who cannot be identified, said she was “very moved” by the decision. Depardieu did not attend the sentencing.
Depardieu is a giant in French cinema, having starred in more than 250 films. He received an Oscar nomination in 1991 for his performance as the swordsman and poet Cyrano de Bergerac. He had repeatedly denied wrongdoing during the trial, but Judge Thierry Donard, in his concluding remarks, said the actor’s explanation of events had been unconvincing.
One of the two plaintiffs, the set decorator, had told the court the actor had groped her all over her body as he trapped her between his legs and made explicit sexual comments.
“He touched everything, including my breasts,” she told the court. “I was terrified, he was laughing.”
Judge Donard said two witnesses corroborated her account, while Depardieu had been contradictory in his accounts.
The trial has placed the global star at the centre of France’s broader reckoning over sexual violence and is seen as a potential watershed for the #MeToo movement in the country.
Carine Durrieu-Diebolt, representing one of the victims, hailed the decision as a victory not only for the two women, “but also for all the women behind this trial”.
More than 20 women have accused Depardieu of misconduct, either publicly or using formal complaints, though none of these have gone to court. Some of the cases were dropped because of a lack of evidence or after the statute of limitations had expired.
On the 2021 set, Depardieu trapped the set dresser with his legs before groping her waist and breasts in front of witnesses. He also used obscene language and had to be pulled away by bodyguards.
The actor groped the assistant director both on set and in the street. The women, who have not waived their anonymity, sat side by side in court on the first day of the four-day trial.
Taking the stand, Depardieu rejected the accusations, saying he’s “not like that”. He acknowledged that he had used vulgar and sexualised language on the film set and that he grabbed the set dresser’s hips during an argument, but denied that his behaviour was sexual.
The trial came in the wake of Gisele Pelicot’s mass rape case at the end of last year and the ongoing trial of ex-surgeon Joel Le Scouarnec in France’s largest-ever child abuse case.
France has grappled for years with its #MeToo movement. While Hollywood saw powerful men fall swiftly and publicly, the French film industry responded more slowly. Some dismissed #MeToo as an American export incompatible with French values, citing concerns over free expression and what they viewed as an erosion of flirtation culture.
At the time of the assaults, Depardieu was already under formal investigation for rape. In 2018, actor Charlotte Arnould accused him of raping her at his home. That case is still active, and in August 2024, prosecutors requested that it go to trial.
His lawyer said after sentencing on Tuesday that they would appeal the decision.
