Hollywood star exposes casting couch horrors, predatory brutes in raw new tell-all memoir

Mamie Van Doren isn’t done spilling secrets.The actress and sex symbol has written a new memoir, “You Thought I Was Dead,” in which she lays bare her decades-long career in showbiz.The 95-year-old is also the subject of a new documentary about her life that’s currently in production.In her latest tell-all, the star addresses Hollywood’s notorious casting couch and how it continues to impact stars today.“Predatory brutes like Bill Cosby and Harvey Weinstein have been ousted, tried and punished by the #MeToo movement,” Van Doren wrote.“Women can, and should, feel empowered by the support of their sisters.… Young women being preyed upon and seduced by rapacious Hollywood producers, stars and studio heads is a tired cliché, but like all clichés, it is based on reality.

The casting couch was, and is, part of Hollywood’s shameful legacy.”“But through all the tears and fears, I am living proof that it is survivable,” Van Doren added.Van Doren painted a picture of Hollywood where young actresses were often vulnerable to powerful men.“It was a classic example of the predatory environment in the movie industry during the so-called Golden Age,” she wrote.“A new starlet in her first movie was like blood in the water to the male sharks at the studio.”Van Doren knows the subject firsthand.Recalling her early years in Hollywood, she described feeling “used” and “guilty,” writing, “I was now part of that multitude of stories about the casting couch.”“Now I felt drained and exposed.

And worst of all, used,” she wrote.“How many more lies would I have to tell before I got what I wanted? As I drove home, I asked myself if this was the way I wanted to become a movie star.Tonight, the answer had clearly been that I would f— for it.

But there was a cold, sick knot in the pit of my stomach, signaling that my conscience was weighing in.”“So, did I want to continue this?” she wrote.“‘Well, I’m in it now,’ I told my...