Alyssa Milano reveals details about a second sexual assault when she was 24: 'I'm not really ready to expose that human'
Alyssa Milano helped make the #MeToo movement go viral by sharing those words, conceived by Tarana Burke, as well as her experience as a victim of sexual assault. While she’s gotten very personal sharing her story of being assaulted at a concert at 19, in a new interview, she talks about a second assault five years later.
While the Insatiable actress, Project Runway All Stars host and political activist, 46, has said she had a second #MeToo story, she spoke about it in an interview with the Washington Post. She said that it happened during a shoot when she was 24.
Milano said that at the time, “I told a lot of people” about the assault, but “nobody did anything.”
Making it worse, “I had to work with him for another six weeks,” she said of the perpetrator.
From her timeline, it occurred around 1997, Milano’s Melrose Place era, but also a time when she worked on several other projects (Below Utopia, Hugo Pool, Fantasy Island) and then took a few years off from making TV and movies. However, she didn’t specify exactly what kind of a shoot it was either.
Milano said that while she detailed her first assault in the press, it’s taken longer to come to a place where she feels ready to share the second one. While she’s told the story to her husband, CAA talent agent Dave Bugliari, parents and therapist, she’s hasn’t shared it publicly.
“I don’t know when that will be,” she said of the right time to fully tell her story, adding “I’m not really ready to expose that human.”
Milano said that sharing the story of her second victimization with loved ones has helped with panic attacks that occurred only on the set and sometimes lasted for days.
“My stomach in knots. It’s brutal,” the Charmed and Who’s the Boss? actress said, explaining how the attacks made her feel. “The walls are closing in, and I can’t catch my breath. It’s sort of primal, and volcanic.”
The mom of two hasn’t had panic attack in almost a year.
In the interview, Milano talks about her political activism — and how it’s brought so many online trolls into her life. For the record, she has no regrets.
“There’s an element of almost satisfaction, maybe being emboldened, that I must be doing something right because they are really angry,” she said. “If I wasn’t so impactful, would they need to be as vicious? Are they trying to silence me, trying to hurt me? Because, like, none of it’s working.”
Though her husband told the paper, “I can’t believe it doesn’t bother her. It bothers the hell out of me. I spend far too much time trolling her trolls.”
Milano also talked about her new podcast, Sorry Not Sorry, and the upcoming book series she’s writing, Hope, which the article described as being "about an African American middle schooler, which is intended to empower children age 8 and older to forge social change.”
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