Tyler Perry has vehemently denied the sexual assault allegations made against him by one of his former actors, calling the accusations a “scam”.
The 55-year-old actor and filmmaker is being sued for alleged sexual assault, battery, quid pro quo, and workplace sexual harassment by an actor who starred in his long-running political drama, The Oval.
The actor, Derek Dixon, who appeared on both the six-season drama and its spinoff Ruthless as Dale, filed the lawsuit in the Los Angeles Superior Court on 13 June.
In the filing, obtained by The Independent, Perry is accused of using his “success and power” and his “considerable influence in the entertainment industry to create a coercive, sexually exploitative dynamic” with Dixon while he was employed as a series regular on The Oval.
In response to the complaint, Matthew Boyd, an attorney for Perry and TPS Production Services, LLC, said, "This is an individual who got close to Tyler Perry for what now appears to be nothing more than setting up a scam. But Tyler will not be shaken down and we are confident these fabricated claims of harassment will fail."
The lawsuit claims that Perry initially promised Dixon “career advancement and creative opportunities, such as producing his pilot and casting him in his show, only to subject him to escalating sexual harassment, assault and battery, and professional retaliation when Mr Dixon did not reciprocate Mr Perry’s unwanted advances”. Dixon alleges that in 2020 Perry climbed into bed with him after a night of drinking and that Perry aggressively groped his buttocks while the pair were in Perry’s trailer on the set of The Oval.
Dixon allegedly met Perry in September 2019 while he was working for the event company that organised the opening party for the media mogul’s Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta, Georgia.
It’s further claimed that from then on, Perry sometimes texted Dixon sexual advances and other times he messaged him about helping him find a job.
After Perry offered Dixon a role in The Oval, the actor quit his job at the events company and Perry’s alleged advances became more frequent.
Dixon claims he was worried he would lose his job if he refused Perry’s advances outright, so he continued to maintain that he was simply not interested in sex. At the end of one season, Perry wrote into The Oval that Dixon’s character had been shot multiple times, but left it unclear as to whether the character had died. Dixon says he interpreted this as Perry putting pressure on him to maintain their relationship or otherwise be written out of the show.
Dixon also alleges that Perry intimated he was interested in producing a show he had written, called Losing It, as a way of making him more dependent on the producer. Dixon says that he then called Perry’s lawyers to check if the pilot was moving ahead, only to be told that it wasn’t. He also claims that he was assaulted by Perry during a 2020 trip to the Bahamas and in 2021, while staying in Perry’s guest house, he was again sexually assaulted and, fearing that he would be raped, slept inside a locked bathroom.
A few days after the incident, Perry allegedly called Dixon and blamed his actions on testosterone supplements. He again promised to make Dixon’s show and bought the rights but never took action to produce it.
According to Dixon, after he complained about the alleged misconduct, “defendants did not make any investigation into the complaint and did not take any steps to prevent further harassment from occurring.” As a result, Dixon “had to quit his job working on the last season of The Oval,” a decision that cost him around $400,000 in lost wages.
“Dixon did not want to be sexually harassed or be placed in danger of a sexual assault again,” the filing states as his reason for leaving the show and giving up the money.
Dixon claims that as a result of Perry’s actions, he suffered from severe depression, anxiety, stomach pains, and nausea and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). He is suing for $260 million in total damages as well as legal expenses.
