Casey Affleck Apologizes For Past 'Unprofessional' Behavior

Academy Award-winning actor Casey Affleck is finally addressing the #MeToo movement and his past involvement in two sexual harassment lawsuits.

In an interview with The Associated Press published on Thursday, Aug. 9, 2018, Affleck opened up about the allegations against him, revealing that he regrets having ever been involved in sexual harassment lawsuits in the first place. "I wish I had found a way to resolve things in a different way. I hate that," he shared.

Affleck explained that he didn't know how to react to the allegations, as he'd never been in that situation before. "It was really embarrassing and I didn't know how to handle it and I didn't agree with everything, the way I was being described, and the things that were said about me," the Manchester By the Sea star said, "but I wanted to try to make it right, so we made it right in the way that was asked at the time."

As Time magazine reported, Affleck faced two sexual harassment allegations in 2010 from women whom he'd worked with on his film I'm Still Here. One woman accused Affleck of getting into her bed while she was sleeping without her consent. The other woman claimed that he'd "violently grabbed [her] arm" in an attempt to pressure her to stay in his hotel room. Both women also said that Affleck had once locked himself and the movie's star, actor Joaquin Phoenix, in the women's shared hotel room, so that the men could have sex with two other women.

Both women's lawsuits were settled out of court.

Stating that he'd been learning a lot from the #MeToo and Time's Up movements, Affleck told AP that he'd "moved from a place of being defensive to one of a more mature point of view." And he'd reportedly realized that he should have taken more responsibility for what had happened. "I was a boss. I was one of the producers on the set," he said.

He admitted, "I really did not know what I was responsible for as the boss. ... But I behaved in a way and allowed others to behave in a way that was really unprofessional. And I'm sorry."

While it's refreshing to see that Affleck owned up to his past mistakes, we're not so sure others in Hollywood will be quick to forgive him — and he has a lot of enemies.