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Asia Argento accuses 'xXx' director Rob Cohen of drugging, raping her after daughter Valkyrie Weather's 2019 claims

Argento becomes the third woman to accuse Rob Cohen of sexual abuse and assault, after Valkyrie Weather and an anonymous woman

Italian actor and director Asia Argento has leveled accusations of sexual abuse against director Rob Cohen of ‘The Fast and the Furious’ and ‘xXx’ fame. Argento’s accusation comes after the director’s own daughter Valkyrie Weather accused him of sexual assault in 2019.

Now, Argento has spoken out about her traumatic experience from 2002 during the filming of ‘xXx’ nearly two decades ago. She claimed that Cohen abused her, coerced her into drinking GHB, a date rape drug, before proceeding to rape her. “At the time, I really didn’t know what it was. I woke up in the morning naked in his bed,” Argento said, talking about her unawareness of the true nature of GHB at the time. 

Argento becomes the third woman to accuse Cohen of sexual abuse and assault, after Valkyrie and an anonymous woman who had opened up about her abuse in 2019. 

What did Asia Argento say about her abuse?

Argento is a leading figure in the #MeToo movement. She first gained prominence in this aspect in 2017, after she spoke out against infamous Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s. She added that though she has had consensual sexual relationships with Weinstein over the course of five years, the producer had initially assaulted her.  

Following her #MeToo complaints against Weinstein, Argento herself was accused of sexual assault by actor Jimmy Bennett in 2018. She denied the allegations and the case was later settled after Argento’s late partner Anthony Bourdain paid Bennett $380,000.

Her accusations against Cohen has surfaced after the actor opened up on the talk show ‘Verissimo’ on January 23, where she was interviewed for promoting her upcoming autobiography ‘Anatomy of a Wild Heart’. She added that she had multiple reasons for not coming forward with the allegations before since she was unsure of what exactly had happened when she was drugged and raped. Argento realized much later when a friend explained to her about GHB and its purpose. 

Initially, Argento was skeptical about coming forward since she was not keen on creating another storm. But, since Cohen was already accused by two women, including his own daughter, Argento decided to speak out about her abuse as well. A representative for Cohen reportedly denied the allegations against him, terming them as “absolutely false.” 

“When they worked together, they had an excellent working relationship and Mr. Cohen considered her a friend, so this claim dating back to 2002 is bewildering, especially given what has been reported about her in recent years,” the representative told AFP on behalf of the director. 

Accusations by daughter Valkyrie Weather

Cohen was first accused of sexual assault by Valkyrie on February 21, 2019, when she spoke out about her ordeal in a public Facebook post. Valkyrie, a transgender woman born as Kyle Cohen, claimed that, “Rob used my body for his own sexual gratification” when she was a child. She claimed that Cohen once painfully abused and molested her in the bath when she was barely two and half years old - an incident that was witnessed by her own mother Diana Mitzner. “....it was so painful that I couldn’t verbalize it for a long time,” she had said. 

In her post, she had alleged that when she was a teenager of 13 years, Cohen took her to see sex workers in brothels of Thailand and the Czech Republic. “I demonstrated from a very early age that I was probably trans and queer, and that was not the child that my dad wanted. He wanted his son to be a straight, hyper-sexual, womanizing bastard like himself. I have my own theory that he thinks that he broke me when he molested me and he was somehow trying to undo that damage by hetero-sexualizing me from a very young age,” Valkyrie shared with The Hollywood Reporter in 2019. 

Valkyrie added that during her transitioning phase, she realized and remembers the episodes of sexual abuse by her father. Initially, she had dismissed her memories of abuse as ‘untrustworthy’ and was unable to pinpoint the reason for her discomfort and unease. Over prolonged introspection and honest conversations with her mother, Valkyrie realized how she was a survivor of sexual assault by her own father. In fact, after her mother Diana Mitzner opened up about the incident, Valkyrie broke off contact with her for a long time. 

"My name is Valkyrie Weather, born Kyle Cohen, the oldest child and trans daughter of film producer/director Rob Cohen (The fast & the Furious, xXx, and The Hurricane Heist). When I was very young, Rob used my body for his own sexual gratification," Weather wrote in a series of tweets in 2019.

Before opening up in public, she had confronted her father about the traumatic incidents over email. Cohen had reportedly replied after a long time, denying all allegations and terming her mother as ‘psychotic’ and equating her with the infamous Son of Sam killer. 

Later, Cohen had categorically denied the accusations, terming them as ‘untrue’ and unimaginable’. 

These remarks were made by the Internet and individual organizations, MEAWW cannot confirm them independently and nor does it support these claims being made on the Internet.