“I never imagined that a woman would attack me”: actress Caroline Ducey claims to have been raped during filming

La comédienne Caroline Ducey affirme avoir été violée lors du tournage du film “Romance” sorti en 1999. TIBOUL PEEX – MAXPPP

The actress Caroline Ducey writes in a book “La Prédation (feminine noun)” that she was the victim of rape during the filming of “Romance”, a film in which she played the main role in 1999. She accuses the director Catherine Breillat who categorically denies it.

She claims to have been raped during the filming of the movie "Romance", by Catherine Breillat, released in 1999. Actress Caroline Ducey made these accusations in her book released on August 28, 2024, "La Prédation (noun feminine)", published by Albin Michel.

Catherine Breillat denies this and intends to file a defamation complaint, France info points out in particular.

“I carried my ghost”

“I carried my ghost for years. I would have died in 2001 if a friend hadn't called my parents”, confides the 47-year-old actress, now mother of a 9-year-old daughter, to Parisien.

The film tells the story of Marie, sexually frustrated in her relationship and who will have a series of new experiences. When Caroline Ducey accepts the role, she is a student and dreams of cinema. The actress claims she was raped while filming a scene.

“I have to hear the words “cunnilingus” and “sodomy”, but at this point, I don't even know what I'm hearing anymore. Catherine asks me to take off my tights and panties, for reasons of “realism”. “I'm doing it”, she says in an interview with Nouvel Obs.

“We start the engine. I feel an intense burning: Reza (the man who plays the scene with her) has performed cunnilingus on me. I lose consciousness, I plunge into a black hole."

"If I had been 30, I would have realized…"

Caroline Ducey shares with the journalist from Parisien, having "felt confident with a woman who was my mother's age." (…) If I had been 30, I would have realized that she was manipulating me. I never would have imagined that a woman would attack me."

Since the book came out, the actress has received support from her partner François Berléand, an assistant director, a makeup artist and an apology from the producer.

"Everything is fake" according to the director

Contacted by Le Parisien, Catherine Breillat rejects the book outright: “It's all false. I'm going to sue. I had her consent. And everything was written for this cunnilingus scene".

Caroline Ducey has not acted since 2012, the year she says she went to see Catherine Breillat at her home "so she could explain".