Embattled actor Armie Hammer has given a lengthy interview in which he claimed he was sexually abused as a child.
As told to Air Mail, Hammer said a youth pastor at his family church sexually abused him for a year when he was 13-years-old.
Hammer attempted to link his childhood trauma to his predilections for BDSM. He said, “What that did for me was it introduced sexuality into my life in a way that it was completely out of my control.
“I was powerless in the situation. I had no agency in the situation. My interests then went to: I want to have control in the situation, sexually.”
Hammer said he told his parents that the pastor made him uncomfortable – but didn’t detail the abuse – and was rebuffed by his family for calling into question the integrity of “a man of god”.
Hammer said the abuse had set a “dangerous precedent” but denied that his need to be sexually in control equated to a violent nature.
He explained to Air Mail, “The whole point of this is mutual pleasure. If you’re engaged in some sort of sexual act with someone and they’re not enjoying themselves, for me, I’m not enjoying myself.”
Hammer has been persona non grata in the public sphere ever since allegations of sexual abuse were levelled against him by several women.
Leaked text messages describing his fantasies involving rape scenarios and cannibalism were followed by accusations of actual rape. Hammer has denied any criminal wrongdoing.
In the fallout, he was dropped from several high-profile projects including the Jennifer Lopez rom-com Shotgun Wedding and political miniseries Gaslit.
He was also marginalised in productions he had already filmed, such as Death on the Nile, where he was virtually invisible in the film’s trailer and wasn’t featured on any individual character posters in the movie’s marketing.
A three-part documentary series, House of Hammer, detailed a history of alleged poor behaviour by Hammer and his family, a wealthy clan enriched by oil money.
His wife, Elizabeth Chambers, had filed for divorce months before the allegations came to light.
Hammer complained to Air Mail that he was no longer able to be hired in the entertainment industry.
“No one will hire me,” he said. “No one will insure me. I can’t get bonded for a project – nothing. And no one will touch me because if they hire me, then they are the people who support abusers.
“And then they’re liable to get cancelled themselves because this fire that is burning itself through town – when they throw someone like me on the fire to protect themselves, what they don’t realise is happening is all they’re doing is making the fire bigger.
“And that fire is out of control and it’s going to burn everyone. And they’re just continually throwing people on it as sacrifices to protect themselves.”
The actor who had his big break on David Fincher’s The Social Network claimed the scandal had cost him between $US14 million and $US16 million in legal fees and lost work, and had to have a friend help him buy groceries.
“I am not only broke, I am massively in debt,” he complained.
In 2022, Hammer was photographed working as a salesperson for a property company in the Cayman Islands. He said he wasn’t working there and wasn’t being paid for it.
Hammer told Air Mail that in the aftermath of the allegations against him, he contemplated suicide but walked himself back. “I couldn’t do that to my kids.”
Hammer claimed that he was now a happier person after time spent in rehab for alcohol and drug abuse – paid for by Robert Downey Jr – and that he wouldn’t wind back the clock even if he could.
“I’m now a healthier, happier, more balanced person. I’m able to be there for my kids in a way I never was.
“I would not go back and undo everything that’s happened to me.”
Among the accusations against Hammer were women who said he repeatedly spoke of his desire to break their ribs and that he carved an “A” into one woman’s body near her genitalia.
One woman, Efrosina Angelova, claimed Hammer “violently raped” her for hours and slapped her head against a wall. Hammer has denied these allegations.
Hammer made one capitulation to his accusers, which was that the power dynamics between him and them were not balanced.
“I would have these younger women in their mid-twenties and I’m in my thirties. I was a successful actor at the time. They could have been happy to just be with me and would have said yes to things that maybe they wouldn’t have said yes to on their own. That’s an imbalance of power.
“I’m here to own my mistakes, take accountability for the fact that I was an arsehole, that I was selfish, that I used people to make me feel better, and when I was done, moved on. And treated people more poorly than they should have been treated.”