Spike Lee apologises after defending Woody Allen over sexual abuse allegations: ‘My words were wrong’

Director previously spoke in defense of his ‘friend’ against ‘cancel culture’

Spike Lee has apologised after he defended Woody Allen over allegations of sexual abuse made against him by Dylan Farrow.

Speaking to New York radio station WOR 710 this week, Lee discussed Farrow’s claim that she was sexually abused as a child by her then-adoptive father. Allen has always vehemently denied the accusation.

“I’d just like to say Woody Allen’s a great, great filmmaker,” Lee said on air. “And this cancel thing is not just Woody.

“I think that, when you know, we look back on it, we’re gonna see that, I don’t know if just short of killing somebody, I don’t know you just erase somebody like they never existed.

"So, Woody’s a friend of mine, a fellow Knicks fan, so I know he’s going through it right now.”

However, Lee then backtracked in a statement on Twitter made last night (13 June), where he wrote: “I Deeply Apologise. My Words Were WRONG. I Do Not And Will Not Tolerate Sexual Harassment, Assault Or Violence. Such Treatment Causes Real Damage That Can’t Be Minimised [sic].”

Allen recently lashed out at “self-serving” Hollywood figures who had distanced themselves from him in the wake of the #MeToo movement.

“The actors have no idea of the facts and they latch on to some self-serving, public, safe position,” he told The Guardian. “Who in the world is not against child molestation?”

“That’s how actors and actresses are, and [denouncing me] became the fashionable thing to do,” he continued. “Like everybody suddenly eating kale.”

Lee is about to release his new film Da 5 Bloods, which has received mixed reviews from critics.

However, The Independent gave the movie three stars, with critic Clarisse Loughrey commenting: “Lee offers up a string of conventional tragedies to explain his psyche, flattening the thornier implications of his character.

“His exploration of the Vietnamese perspective – and the idea that black GIs had more in common with those they were fighting than those who gave the orders – also feels cut short by Lee’s desire to keep faithful to his rollicking adventure yarn. Da 5 Bloods is so busy with ideas, thoughts, and passions that, at times, it feels like it’s drowning in them.”