Michael Apted dies at 79: ‘Up’ series director defended sexual assault allegation with 33-year-old calendar
British filmmaker Michael Apted, best known for making the ‘Up’ series of documentaries, has died at the age of 79. Roy Ashton at the Gersh Agency confirmed Apted's death, though no details of his passing have been reported as of yet.
Apted made his feature directorial debut with 1972’s ‘The Triple Echo’, starring Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed. He also directed ‘Coal Miner’s Daughter’, ‘Gorillas in the Mist’, ‘Continental Divide’, ‘Class Action’, ‘Gorky Park’, ‘Thunderheart’, ‘Blink’, ‘Extreme Measures’, ‘Enigma’, ‘Nell’, and ‘Enough’. Apted had more recently directed a number of episodes of the Showtime series ‘Ray Donovan’ and ‘Masters of Sex’.
In his ‘Up’ series of documentaries, he profiled a varied group of young Britons and revisited them every seven years to see how they had fared since. ‘Seven Up!’ was originally supposed to be a "one-off”. But then ‘7 Plus Seven’ happened. Apted helmed every subsequent edition: ‘21 Up’ in 1977, ‘28 Up’ in 1984, ‘35 Up’ in 1991, ‘42 Up’ in 1998, ‘49 Up’ in 2005, ‘56 Up’ in 2012, and ‘63 Up’ in 2019. Apted also served as president of the Directors Guild of America from 2003-09.
DGA president Thomas Schlamme said in a statement, “Our hearts are heavy today as we mourn the passing of esteemed director, longtime DGA leader, and my friend Michael Apted. His legacy will be forever woven into the fabric of cinema and our Guild. A fearless visionary as a director and unparalleled Guild leader, Michael saw the trajectory of things when others didn’t, and we were all the beneficiaries of his wisdom and lifelong dedication."
While the filmmaker’s legacy is a sparkling one, there is also a dark part. In 2018, The Wrap revealed in an exclusive report that film executive Rhonda Talbot had accused the filmmaker of inviting her to his hotel room in Paris and sexually assaulting her in 1985. Per Talbot, he invited her to look at some photos in his room, and once there, he allegedly took off his clothes, pinned her to the bed, and tried to rape her. She said that she only escaped by “kneeing him in the groin”. She said, “He chased me out the door, still naked, saying: ‘Stop resisting! Stop resisting!’” Her allegation arrived after more than three decades and after Apted dubbed the #MeToo movement as “hysterical” in an interview.
But Apted’s attorneys contested the claim. And with images of calendar entries no less. Apted’s calendar, as per The Wrap, showed that the director had five meals with Talbot in the seven months after she had allegedly kneed him in the groin to stop a sexual assault. Apted’s attorneys also claimed there were more factual inconsistencies in Talbot's story. “It is clear that Ms. Talbot has materially changed her story when she was challenged on the specific details thereof,” Apted’s attorney said. However, as per the report, a couple of hours before he dug up the 33-year-old calendar, Apted said he didn’t remember meeting Talbot at all or even know who she was. “None of this makes any sense to me,” he told TheWrap. “The name doesn’t mean anything to me.”
“That Ms. Talbot would choose to dine with Mr. Apted on five separate occasions only a month after he allegedly forced himself on her in a Paris hotel room simply makes no sense,” Apted’s attorney argued. “It is not plausible that she would accept an invitation to see him even one more time if he had acted as she alleges.”
But Talbot’s allegations were corroborated by three other people -- two friends whom she had spoken to about the incident, and her therapist, who diagnosed Talbot with depression and post-traumatic stress. Dr. Arlene Drake spoke to The Wrap with Talbot’s permission and said, “People think, ‘Oh well, nothing really happened. She didn’t really get raped. But that trauma of being held down and not knowing what will happen next, that’s a very traumatic experience. It’s like being in a war and coming out alive, you’re still traumatized.”
Apted was thrice married, the first time to Jo Apted, the second time to screenwriter Dana Stevens. One of the director’s sons by Jo Apted, sound editor Paul Apted, died from colon cancer in 2014. Apted is survived by his third wife Paige Simpson, whom he married in January 2014; son Jim Apted from his marriage to Jo Apted; son John from his marriage to Stevens; and daughter Lily Mellis from a relationship with Tania Mellis.