Actress Julianna Margulies has come forward to share her own story amidst the ongoing conversation surrounding s**ual assault and harassment in Hollywood.
Margulies claims that she had a frightening encounter with actor Steven Seagal, her co-star in the 1991 film Out for Justice.
A representative for Seagal did not respond to PEOPLE's request for comment on Friday.
During an interview with Jenny Hutt on SiriusXM's Just Jenny, Margulies revealed, “When I was 23, a casting director, who happened to be a woman, informed me that Steven Seagal wanted to go over a scene with me in his hotel room at 10 o'clock at night.”
Margulies, who lived in Brooklyn at the time, declined the invitation due to safety concerns.
She explained, “I don't do that.
I don't travel.
I don't have money for a cab.” Despite her reservations, the casting director assured her that transportation would be reimbursed and added, “And I'm here, a woman.” Margulies continued, “I arrived at the hotel at 10:40, but she wasn't there.
However, he was.
Alone.
He made sure to show me his gun, which was the first time I had ever seen one in real life.
Fortunately, I managed to leave without any harm.”
Seagal is the latest prominent figure in Hollywood to be accused of s**ual misconduct following the Harvey Weinstein scandal.
Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero recently came forward with allegations against Seagal, nearly a decade after Jenny McCarthy recalled an incident in which he supposedly asked her to disrobe during a private audition for the movie Under Siege 2 in 1998.
A spokesperson for Seagal previously refuted McCarthy's claims, while no response has been given regarding any of the accusations by Seagal's representatives to PEOPLE.
Margulies also shared an alleged incident involving Harvey Weinstein.
She disclosed, “I have my own Harvey story, but I was never raped nor harmed.
I don't know how I managed to escape from that hotel room.” During her interview on SiriusXM, she stated, “It always starts with, ‘I'm a healer, I want to massage you,' and such.
I screamed my way out…But the point is, for years and years, we all just brushed it off.”
She concluded, “And because of my horrifying experience with Steven Seagal in that room, I refused to meet Harvey Weinstein in his hotel room when another woman brought me, promising a screen test.”
Margulies stressed the importance of addressing the issue of s**ual harassment in Hollywood, including the involvement of women who enable predatory men.
“Who are these women?
One thing I want to make clear in this dialogue, together with other women and men, is that it's not always the men who are terrible,” Margulies expressed.
Over the past few weeks, more than 50 women, including numerous assault allegations, have accused Weinstein of s**ual misconduct.
The movie mogul has consistently denied any allegations of nonconsensual s**.
During her appearance on Just Jenny, Margulies was joined by Erin Merryn, a survivor of childhood s**ual abuse who is fighting for the implementation of Erin's Law, which mandates schools to educate students about s**ual abuse awareness and prevention.
Margulies, a long-time advocate for this law, emphasized that the issue of s**ual abuse should not be disregarded.
“We must start with our children,” she stated.
