Minnie Driver claims producers wouldn’t let her wear wetsuit on Hard Rain set to ‘see my nipples’

Minnie Driver recalls life on the Hard Rain movie set after she told her agents about her producers’ alleged behaviour.

Minnie Driver and Christian Slater star in Hard Rain.

Minnie Driver is speaking out about the sexism and poor working conditions she says she experienced while filming the 1998 action thriller Hard Rain, which also starred Christian Slater and Morgan Freeman.

According to the actress, she wasn’t allowed to wear a wetsuit under her clothes like the rest of her castmates because producers “wanted to see [her] nipples” through her shirt, reports Decider.

The film — which took place during a natural disaster — used “20 million gallons of water” and “huge rain machines” to give the effect of a heavy rainstorm, Driver recalled on a recent episode of SiriusXM’s I Weigh with Jameela Jamil.

“It was tough, like it was a tough movie, but everybody else could wear a wetsuit underneath their costume,” she said.

“And I was told by the producers that I couldn’t because they wanted to see my nipples, and that there was no point in having the wet T-shirt if you couldn’t have what was underneath it.”

She continued, “[I] was very kind of plainly told, like, ‘You are an idiot if you don’t understand that this is what’s going on.’ And I remember saying, ‘This is wrong.’”

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Minnie Driver on the set of Hard Rain Year in 1998. Picture: Alamy

Driver says co-stars such as Christian Slater were allowed to wear wetsuits under their clothes but she was not. Picture: Alamy

Driver said she finally decided to call her agent with her concerns.

However, doing so resulted in a hostile environment on set, she claimed.

“People wouldn’t speak to me on the set. I was so punished for it,” she said. “It was leaked to the press that I’d called and complained about conditions. But it was [as] if there were nothing to complain about and that I were just complaining. So it’s this sort of … this gaslighting, media gaslighting that’s supported by the environment that you are in. And then you have to stay in that environment.”

The actress says she was then punished on set for speaking up to her agent. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

After filming for seven months, Driver said she eventually began to view herself differently.

“We shot that movie for seven months. So, eventually, you do turn on yourself,” she explained.

“You do go, ‘It n to put your hand up and go, ‘This isn’t right.’”

When contacted was my fault for saying anything, you stupid big mouth. You should have shut up.’ And that goes in and then alters the way in which you kind of see yourself and your natural inclination for comment by Entertainment Weekly, Hard Rain costume designer Kathleen Detoro said that she did not recall the incident in question, though she said “producers had me supply everyone including crew with wetsuits” and “the actors [decided] if they [wanted] to wear it or not.”

This article originally appeared in Decider and was reproduced with permission