Anna Richardson has revealed she was out of work for two years after accusing Arnold Schwarzenegger of groping her and suing him for defamation.
The Naked Attraction presenter, 52, claimed Schwarzenegger, 76, touched her breast when she interviewed him on the ITV series Big Screen in 2000 while he was promoting his new film, The Sixth Day.
Richardson made these claims in an interview with the Los Angeles Times in 2003 — when Schwarzenegger was running for governor of California — in which several women accused the star of sexual misconduct.
She told the newspaper tAlthough the actor had been ‘a perfect gentleman’ in previous encounters, during the interview at the Dorchester hotel in London he said: ‘This time it was very different. He was already a little excited. He kept looking at my breasts, kept asking if I was working out.
‘I went to shake his hand and he picked me up on his knee and said, ‘Before you go, I want to know if your breasts are real.’
Confession: Anna Richardson has revealed she was out of work for two years after accusing Arnold Schwarzenegger of groping her and suing him for defamation
Allegation: The Naked Attraction host claimed Arnold Schwarzenegger touched her breast when she interviewed him in 2000 while he was promoting his new movie
Richardson, who was 29 at the time, said she looked around the room for help, but no one came to her aid.
She continued: ‘That’s when he circled my left nipple with his finger and said, “Yes, they’re real.”’
Schwarzenegger’s campaign team refuted the allegations, claiming it was Richardson who provocatively approached the star, grabbed her right breast and said, “What do you think about this?”
In response to allegations from several women who claimed to have been groped by the Hollywood star, he apologized for “behaving badly at times” and doing things that were “not good, that I thought were playful.”
Schwarzenegger said he would address the details of the allegations after the election, but later dismissed the claims as “old news” and announced he would not appoint an investigator to look into the women’s claims.
Following the publication of the LA Times article, Richardson sued Schwarzenegger and his top aides, Sean Walsh and publicist Sheryl Main, for defamation, claiming that their denials implied that she had “intentionally and dishonestly” fabricated the allegations.
The defamation lawsuit was settled out of court, with lawyers for Schwarzenegger and Richardson stating: “The parties are content to put this matter behind them and are pleased that this legal dispute has now been resolved.”
Richardson reflected on the incident when she appeared on Simply Be’s Shaping success YouTube series.
Asked by presenter Fleur East to remember a positive moment that has ‘shaped’ her in life, Richardson confessed: ‘This comes with a negative moment, it’s a yinyang thing.
‘I had to interview Arnold Schwarzenegger in a kind of junket situation, where you are, as it were, in a line of journalists in a sausage factory. You go to a hotel, the star sits there, you do a four-minute interview with them about their movie and then you leave.
“And during this particular interview with Arnie – and I have to choose my words very carefully here – there was an incident. Or there was an alleged incident between us and then I took legal action and sued Schwarzenegger and his team for defamation.
“So I have to be very careful what I say, but I sued him and we reached an out-of-court settlement. This is a very big story packed into about 10 seconds of explanation, but that moment ultimately defined me.”
During the incident: Richardson, who was 29 at the time, said she looked around the room for help, but no one came to her aid (pictured in 2000)
Allegations: Richardson made these claims in a 2003 interview when Schwarzenegger was running for governor of California (pictured at a campaign rally)
Revealing the impact it had on her career, Richardson admitted she was out of work for two years and fell into debt.
She continued: “I was out of work for a long time, which was very difficult.
‘So I went from presenting a show and working on television to signing up and people in my local job center saying, “Are you that girl doing that show?” Do I just get my housing benefit?”
“So they were very difficult times, but it taught me real resilience and not being afraid to stand up against what I perceived as injustice.”
Richardson also spoke about the importance of speaking out ahead of the 2017 #MeToo movement.
She explained, “I think women have been pushing this message for decades and it’s falling on deaf ears.
“But certainly in terms of my situation and what allegedly happened, I took legal action, and this was well ahead of the #MeToo movement. So when the whole #MeToo thing happened, I felt really frustrated about that.
‘I thought seriously? Are we seriously talking about this again 15 years later? It still happens, but I was there 15 years earlier.
“I think there’s something about women and people speaking truth to power and saying this is actually not okay.”
When asked how she found the courage to speak out, Richardson said, “It was a strange knowing that I have to do this.
“What happened is not right and it’s about speaking truth to power and saying, ‘I don’t care who you are. I don’t care what threats you come out with.’
“This is about standing up and saying: this is wrong, this is unacceptable and I have to make this right.”
Richardson further noted, “There is something in this country, in this culture, and as women we are very afraid to say I’m not happy with this or that we need to talk about this.
‘Especially when we want to confront, we as women are told that you are not allowed to confront, you must be quiet.
‘While it is acceptable to do that if you are a man. I have resisted the fact that as a woman I am forced into a box, that is something that will affect me. I can hardly resist speaking out about something that is unjust or not right.’
Richardson was able to enter the television industry by working behind the scenes as a producer and later resumed presenting.
She has hosted a range of Channel 4 shows including Supersize vs Superskinny, The Sex Education Show and Secret Eaters.
Richardson is the current host of Naked Attraction and Changing Rooms.
Speaking out: Richardson told host Fleur East about the aftermath ‘it was very difficult, but that taught me real resilience and not to be afraid to stand up against what I perceived as injustice’