The Facts of Sexual Harassment in Hollywood: #NotThisShow

The floodgates have opened and women and children in Hollywood have finally been coming forward and being believed about the abuse they suffered at the hands of powerful grown men. Notably, Facts alumna Molly Ringwald wrote a powerful account in the New Yorker about her own experience as a young actress.

When I was thirteen, a fifty-year-old crew member told me that he would teach me to dance, and then proceeded to push against me with an erection. When I was fourteen, a married film director stuck his tongue in my mouth on set. At a time when I was trying to figure out what it meant to become a sexually viable young woman, at every turn some older guy tried to help speed up the process. And all this went on despite my having very protective parents who did their best to shield me. I shudder to think of what would have happened had I not had them.

When I read this, the first thing I did was the math. Could any of this have happened on the Facts of Life set?

No, it turns out. Molly was only eleven or twelve when she was on Facts; she must have experienced her crew creeps in other projects.

But what about the others? This was a show with a cast full of young girls, filming and airing during the height of a period when sexual harassment and assault were often treated as vehicles of comedy. Our own beloved Facts is guilty of promoting creepage. It almost strains credulity to think it never happened to any of them.

But it wouldn’t be the first time that the Facts girls defied the odds. None of the Facts girls fell prey to the alcohol and drug problems that plagued so many child actors of hit 80s sitcoms. All four of the child stars of the last eight seasons of the show are alive and generally well, working and apparently taking good care of themselves.

Kim Fields, who played Tootie, reacted to the deluge of sexual assault claims for her local news station. Unfortunately, the video no longer seems to be available, but if the synopsis is to be believed, she was never abused, and the Facts set was indeed a safe place. There’s no record of Nancy McKeon (Jo) or Mindy Cohn (Natalie) commenting on sexual abuse at at all.

It’s too much to hope, though, that our womderful women escape statistics. In researching this article, I discovered that in one of her books, Lisa Whelchel (Blair), recalls having experienced sexual abuse. I don’t know if she ever goes into any more detail; the book should be delivered to my house on Friday.

I’m relieved that my search into the relationship between Facts and Hollywood sexual abuse came up empty with regard to the show. In an environment. That one of our girls experienced sexual abuse saddens me. Unfortunately it does not surprise me.