Wendy Williams has opened up about being sexually assaulted by R&B singer Sherrick in the 1980s.
During a Tuesday (12 January) panel promoting her upcoming Lifetime biopic, Wendy Williams: The Movie, the talk show host and media personality spoke for the first time about being date raped by the late R&B singer (Sherrick died in 1999).
Describing meeting Sherrick during an interview, Williams, 56, told People how she was “mesmerised” by the singer at the time.
“He mesmerised me with his twinkling eyes,” she said. “He flipped the interview around to where he was interviewing me – I was just gaga over this man and he asked me to go to an opening party, an album release party, with him that night.”
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“And before the party, I was date raped by him,” she continued, noting how she was also date raped while in college.
“Those types of things happen to girls all the time,” Williams continued. “And they've been happening a lot, to a lot of our mothers, grandmothers, great-great-grandmothers and their great-great-grandmothers, too.”
Wendy Williams: The Movie stars Ciera Payton as Williams and Morocco Omari as the media personality's ex-husband Kevin Hunter. The movie chronicles Williams' rise from New York-based "shock jockette" to the host of the nationally syndicated Wendy Williams Show.
The film will also look at Williams' past issues with substance abuse as well as her divorce from her husband of more than 20 years, Hunter. (Hunter and Williams divorced in 2019 after Hunter admitted to fathering a child with whom he was having an affair.)
When asked what it was like looking back on her relationship in the movie, which she also executive produced, Williams said that she had "no regrets”.
“The life that I'm living right now is my best life, and I have no guilt about saying that,” she said. “I don't regret meeting Kevin, I don't regret falling in love, I don't regret staying with him for all 25 years, 21 of them married... I like who I am, so I have no regrets.”
Wendy Williams: The Movie premieres on 30 January at 8:00 PM ET on Lifetime.
