An unnamed woman from Maryland is suing the award-winning composer behind 'Wednesday' music and his company for gender violence, sexual harassment and negligence between 1997 and 2002.
- Oct 20, 2023
AceShowbiz - Danny Elfman is facing a lawsuit over allegations he abused an unnamed woman from Maryland between 1997 and 2002. The woman, known as Jane Doe XX, is suing the award-winning composer and his company, Musica de la Muerta, for sexual assault, gender violence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, sexual harassment and negligence, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
A spokesperson for Elfman, 70, said, "The allegations of misconduct made against Mr. Elfman are baseless and absurd. His legal team is assessing all options and he will vigorously defend these claims in court." In the lawsuit, the woman claims to have met the composer, who created "The Simpsons" theme song, as well as the music for "Wednesday", "The Nightmare Before Christmas", "Spider-Man" and many other movies and TV shows, at a party in 1997 when she was a 21-year-old-old film student.
She claims he treated her as a "protege" and took to a variety of film events and even brought her to recording sessions when he was working on the score for 1997 movie "Good Will Hunting". In the suit, the woman alleges when she was alone with him, Elfman would remove "all of his clothing until he was completely nude, and walked around nude in front of Plaintiff, exposing his genitals."
The lawsuit added, "Defendant Elfman expressed to Plaintiff that this was the only way he could work, be creative, and successful ... she had no choice but to always comply with his requests, and Plaintiff felt this was a condition of their continued relationship."
It comes after Elfman previously settled a lawsuit from composer Noma Abadi, who sued him in 2018 over allegations of sexual harassment. She accused him of harassing her in 2015 and 2016 and he agreed to pay her $830,0000 to settle the case, although Elfman denied anything untoward happened.
Rolling Stone magazine discovered a police report filed by the pianist in November 2017, in which she alleged the 70-year-old musician exposed himself and m********** in front of her, with LAPD categorizing the allegations as "indecent exposure."
Elfman, who has daughters Lola and Mali with ex-wife Geri Eisenmenger and son Oliver with wife Bridget Fonda, denied the "vicious and wholly false allegations" and insisted the woman was out for revenge when he spurned her advances. He told Rolling Stone, "How do I respond to accusations so serious that being innocent is not a valid defense? It is excruciating to consider that a 50-year career may be destroyed in one news cycle as a result of vicious and wholly false allegations about sexual misconduct."
"Ms. Abadi's allegations are simply not true," he insisted, "I allowed someone to get close to me without knowing that I was her 'childhood crush' and that her intention was to break up my marriage and replace my wife. When this person realized that I wanted distance from her, she made it clear that I would pay for having rejected her. I allowed an ill-advised friendship to have far-reaching consequences, and that error in judgment is entirely my fault. I have done nothing indecent or wrong, and my lawyers stand ready to prove with voluminous evidence that these accusations are false. This is the last I will say on this subject."
