Marvel star Jeremy Renner has denied allegations that he sent “unsolicited pornographic images of himself” to Chinese filmmaker Yi Zhou.
Zhou, 37, who collaborated on both a documentary earlier this year with Renner, 54, also accused the Hawkeye actor of threatening to call Immigration and Customs Enforcement on her.
In a statement to Page Six, a legal representative for Renner said: “The allegations being made are totally inaccurate and untrue.”
Renner’s lawyer Martin Singer went on to claim that Zhou is lashing out after Renner “rejected her romantic advances.”
Singer says the two met on one occasion in Reno, Nevada, when Renner was interviewed for Zhou’s Chronicles of Disney documentary. He claims they shared a “brief consensual encounter.”
According to the lawyer, Renner ignored the filmmaker’s subsequent “sexually explicit messages expressing her love.” He claims that Zhou “had been relentlessly harassing and threatening [his] client with hundreds of unsolicited and unwanted messages.”
The Independent has contacted Renner’s representative for further comment.
In a series of Instagram posts shared Monday, Zhou alleged that the Mayor of Kingstown actor first introduced himself to her “out of the blue” in June by sending her a string of “unwanted” images via WhatsApp and direct messages.
“After having calls and text discussions he allured me and sold me he [was] looking for a relation and of course seduced / flatted [sic] that he was a Hollywood star fantasizing and loving me so much I believed in him,” she claimed.
Zhou, who last month said she and Renner were in a relationship, added: “The power of love and embarked on the most difficult months + 2 Oscar running projects I kindly invited him to be part.”
Speaking to the Daily Mail in a new interview, Zhou claimed that during one of their meetings at his home about Chronicles of Disney, Renner got drunk and “yelled for two hours,” leaving her to fear for her life.
“I was discussing about the doc logistics, then he drank a bottle of wine alone and got angry and angry yelling for two hours,” Zhou said. “I had to lock myself in a room to be safe praying he would not come into the room at night as he was really angry. I did not say a word, I was so scared for my life.”
She said at the time she shared her location with her team and parents in case anything happened to her. In screenshots of alleged text messages sent to her Disney colleagues and obtained by the Mail, Zhou called Renner “violent.”
“I am worried,” she told one co-worker, adding that she was at his home alone. “Do you think you will be safe staying there?” her co-worker asked, to which Zhou replied: “Yes, I should be OK.”
In a separate text chain, Zhou was told by a different colleague to “get out of there as fast as you can.”
“I did not reach out to him, he pursued me,” she told the Mail. “I didn’t even know his name, never watched a movie of his. He used me and denied me and denied our work.”
She added in one of her recent Instagram posts that Renner “has refused to make any public promotion” for their projects, “despite our repeated pleas public and private for support.”
“Instead, he has allowed without stepping up for false information to spread through fan accounts falsely claiming that the documentary was generated by AI and denying any personal relation or professional collaboration,” she wrote. “These statements are untrue.”
Zhou continued, alleging: “When I called him out privately about his past misconduct and asked him to behave properly, to respect me as a woman and as a filmmaker, he threatened to call immigration/ICE on me, an act that deeply shocked and frightened me.
“Such behavior is unacceptable and emblematic of the imbalance of power that continues to harm women in our industry,” she wrote.
She provided the Mail with additional screenshots of an alleged text exchange with Renner, in which she called him out for using “apps to send d*** pix,” warning him that “no one said anything so far.”
“Immigration will be notified of your —,” he allegedly responded, with the rest of the message cut off. Zhou reportedly refused to share the full text with the Mail.
Renner, who survived a near-fatal snowplow accident in January 2023, has previously been accused of abusive behavior by his ex-wife, Sonni Pacheco, to whom he was married from 2014 to 2015.
Following their divorce, Pacheco sought sole custody of their daughter, Ava, accusing Renner of being an “unfit parent.” She accused him of using drugs and having them within reach of their daughter, and threatening to kill Pacheco and himself.
The Hawkeye star vehemently denied the accusations in a July interview with The Guardian, calling them “clickbait.” Renner and Pacheco share joint custody of their now-12-year-old daughter.
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