The actor acknowledges the s-x scandal that changed his career forever and reveals that it happened because he was in a bad mood after one of his performances
In 1995 Hugh Grant grabbed the headlines of all the media and it was not because of the success or failure of any of his films. The images of the actor arrested by the Los Angeles police after being caught in his car with Divine Brown, a prostitute who was performing fellatio on him, went around the world and marked a before and after not only in Grant's life , whose acting career was taking off, but also in the history of Hollywood, which will always keep him in his memory.
Now, almost 26 years later, the interpreter of Nothing Hill has said that he was unfaithful to his then partner, Liz Hurley, with this s-x worker to solve the frustrations that had caused him his last performance that he would soon see the light. In a new interview on Marc Maron's WTF podcast, the British star has admitted that the discomfort he felt after seeing his Hollywood debut film, Nine Months, was what caused him to turn to the services of Divine Brown who, by the way , knew how to take advantage of the scandal and ended up leaving prostitution and earning millions of dollars.
“The movie was about to come out, and I had a bad feeling about it. I went to see a screening. The whole cast was brilliant, but my performance was so atrocious that I wasn't in a good mood," said the now 60-year-old performer. Contrary to his premonitions, the film, which was released two weeks after the incident, helped catapult him to stardom. "In the end the movie did well at the box office, in fact I think it did pretty well, and that's all that really matters to Hollywood," he added. The film, directed by Chris Columbus and in which Julianne Moore and Robin Williams participated along with Grant, ended up raising first 12.5 million dollars in the United States and finally almost 140 million worldwide.
Hugh Grant and Divine Brown were arrested near Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, after the actor paid the prostitute $50 to practice her services aboard a brand new BMW. Grant was then sentenced to pay a $1,000 fine and attend an AIDS education program. In his subsequent statement, the Love Actually actor was repentant: “Last night I did something completely crazy. I have hurt the people I love and embarrassed the people I work with. For both things, I'm very sorry."
Following the scandal, Hugh Grant and Elizabeth Hurley, who formed one of the most iconic couples of the 1990s, stayed together for several more years before ending their 13-year relationship in 2000. They remain close friends today, and the actor He is godfather to Hurley's 18-year-old son, Damian, whose businessman father Steve Bing took his own life last year.
Although it is the first time that he has been so sincere and openly talks about what happened, Grant had already mentioned the scandal on other occasions, such as when in 2016 he admitted in an interview on CBS News that at that time he was a "very mischievous". "I was drunk. And yes, it was an unfortunate situation, ”he said then, without wanting to go into more detail.
This is one of the biggest scandals in Hollywood history, but not the only one involving Hugh Grant. Ten years later, in 2005, the actor was once again the protagonist on this occasion for being one of the victims of the case of illegal wiretapping of the Sunday newspaper News of the World (NoW). An issue that went to court and that has lasted until 2018, when the interpreter was compensated with 110,000 euros in damages that the actor will donate to the group of activists Hacked Off, creators of a campaign against illegal interceptions.
