Kate Winslet says she would have fought back against any sexual advance from Harvey Weinstein

KATE Winslet hasn’t experienced the sexual advances from Harvey Weinstein others have alleged, but she’s made it clear what would have happened if he’d tried anything.

KATE Winslet has long had a tumultuous working relationship with Harvey Weinstein. While she accuses him of being a bully, she said he never tried anything sexual on her.

But if had tried he would have been in for a shock, as the actress says she “would have taken off a heel and put it right through his face”.

“My parents raised me well,” she added.

Winslet’s experience goes back to The Reader, a Weinstein production for which she took home the Best Actress award at the 2009 Academy Awards.

She told the Los Angeles Times on the weekend that she made a “deliberate” decision not to thank the producer when she made her speech for the award.

Explaining further to news.com.au, the actress said: “I hadn’t heard the stories about him, but to be honest with you, Harvey was always so impossible to deal with that it’s kind of not a surprise, sadly.

“But now that I’ve heard about it, I was as shocked and appalled and horrified as anyone.

Actor Kate Winslet in a scene from the 2008 film The Reader.

“Emma Thompson (who worked with Weinstein when she starred in Brideshead Revisited in 2007) and I were talking about this the other day. It’s not that surprising given the level of awful behaviour that we all have experienced with Harvey. I don’t know a single person who hasn’t experienced some unpleasantness on a professional or business level.”

Winslet is in New York to promote her upcoming movie, Wonder Wheel, directed by Woody Allen who recently defended Weinstein, telling the BBC the situation was sad for the producer, as his life was “so messed up”. The 81-year-old filmmaker later clarified his comments and said Weinstein was a “sad, sick, man”.

Brimming with emotion, Winslet says, “The whole situation makes me so f**king angry, excuse my language. It makes me want to cry. I wholeheartedly support these women; they are victims. It is disgraceful, it’s disgusting, it is absolutely appalling, and any woman — in any workplace, anywhere in the world — should never, ever have to endure this level of degrading, vile treatment.

“My hope is that when all of this horrific-ness is over, this will in some way send a message to other women, in any workplace, that if this happens to them, they must speak up. We will believe them. We will help them and we will stop it. This is a time, more than ever, when women have to come together and absolutely unite and say: ‘No, we are equal to men. We will not be treated in this way. We have to change this now.’”

Actress Kate Winslet pictured with her Oscar after winning the Best Actress award for The Reader in 2009. Pic: Jason Merritt/Getty Images

Disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein pictured on May 23, 2017. Pic: Yann Coatsaliou / AFP

With an array of actresses, models and former assistants coming forward — including Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie — it seems that Winslet was in the minority of female Hollywood figures who were not witness to the sight of Weinstein in an open bathrobe.

“I just feel very fortunate that as a woman who started making films at the age of 17, I had a strong female agent, who I still have, and I have never been more grateful,” the Titanic star said. “She has consistently protected me from this kind of treatment, never putting me in an environment in which I would have possibly felt vulnerable or in any way manipulated. I am one of the lucky ones. I had a career established fairly early on, so I was never, ever placed in one of these awful hotel room scenarios. I’ve never been in that situation.”

On to happier subjects, Wonder Wheel leads us to the subject of love. Her husband, Ned Rocknroll, is sitting unobtrusively in the hotel suite. Winslet glanced over at him, eyes welling up, and said: “I can’t look at you, Ned! He’ll start crying and then I’ll start crying, but [love] is absolutely everything, it’s the underpinning of a family. It’s the underpinning of my whole life and it’s every adventure.” Growing more flustered she said with a laugh: “Oh, Ned, go out!” After composing herself, the mum-of-three said: “Sorry, I can’t say anything else, otherwise I’ll fall apart. But in a good way,” she smiled.

Originally published as Kate Winslet says she would have fought back against any sexual advance from Harvey Weinstein