Why Emily Ratajkowski Says She Wouldn't "Be Famous" if She'd Shared Robin Thicke Allegations Years Ago

Emily Ratajkowski explained why she didn't come forward sooner with her groping allegations against "Blurred Lines" singer Robin Thicke.

By Cydney Contreras Oct 05, 2021 8:36 PMTags
Watch: Emily Ratajkowski Accuses Robin Thicke of Groping Her Breasts

Emily Ratajkowski was thrust into the spotlight the moment she appeared in Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams' music video for "Blurred Lines."

She was one of three women who danced around Thicke and Williams as they performed the controversial song, at one point stripping off her white crop top for a scene in which she and Thicke are in bed. According to an excerpt of her upcoming memoir, My Body, published by The Sunday Times, Ratajkowski was enjoying her time on set until Thicke allegedly groped her.

"Suddenly, out of nowhere, I felt the coolness and foreignness of a stranger's hands cupping my bare breasts from behind," she wrote. "I instinctively moved away, looking back at Robin Thicke."

E! News reached out to Thicke for comment and did not hear back.

Now, the Inamorata designer tells People she had her reasons for not speaking out sooner: "I was an unknown model and if I had spoken out or complained, I would not be where I am today; I would not be famous."

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In 2014, Gone Girl director David Fincher told GQ that he and Ben Affleck picked Ratajkowski for the role of Affleck's much younger mistress after seeing the "Blurred Lines" music video.

"I was talking with Ben [Affleck], and what I wanted for the Andie role was someone who could be incredibly divisive among men and women in the audience," Fincher recalled. "We needed somebody where, at the moment she appears, the women are going, 'That is unconscionable and despicable.' And you also have the men going, 'Yes, but...' And so Ben said, 'Yeah, like the girl in the 'Blurred Lines' video.'"

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Fincher noted that once they met the model, they knew she was the person for the role. "She wasn't smitten with being the girl of the moment," he explained. "She's no bullshit. If somebody's gonna ruin their life on a 21-year-old, they have to be special, and she was."

Ratajkowski's appearance in the thriller led to more roles in blockbuster films, including Amy Schumer's I Feel PrettyIn Darkness and Welcome Home. Moreover, her modeling career took off, with the mother of one walking in runway shows for Bottega Veneta, Dolce & Gabbana and Versace. 

It was through these experiences that Ratajkowski has grown into the person she is today, she says, a process she documents in her memoir. She tells People, "I wrote a book about the evolution of my politics and that includes a lot of different experiences from my career and my life and the way that I felt and thought about those experiences have evolved.

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"I hope people are able to read the essay and understand the nuance behind these kinds of situations," she adds.

Ratajkowski acknowledges that it's a "complicated" situation as she models for a living, but hopes to start a conversation about the sexualization of female bodies. "I think all women, we all play the game, capitalizing off of your image, commodifying their body," she reflects. "That's the world that we live in and I would never tell a woman that she shouldn't but I also would hope that they understand that that's sort of a double-edged sword."

All Ratajkowski can do for now is raise her and Sebastian Bear-McClard's son, Sylvester Apollo Bear, to respect all individuals. She shares, "I would like the way that we think about women and men to change and the power dynamics that are unspoken, to change."

For free, confidential help, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673 or visit rainn.org.