xXx Director Rob Cohen Denies Asia Argento’s Sexual Assault Accusations

Asia Argento has come forward with new sexual assault allegations against director Rob Cohen.

The actress told the media that the Fast and the Furious helmer, who she worked with on the 2002 Vin Diesel action film xXx, drugged her with GHB—a depressant commonly referred to as a “date-rape drug”—and sexually assaulted her.

She first told Milan newspaper Il Corriere della Sera on Jan. 21, “At the time, I really didn’t know what it was. I woke up in the morning naked in his bed.”

She doubled down on her claims, telling Variety magazine on Jan. 24 that she details the alleged assault in her upcoming autobiography, Anatomy of a Wild Heart.

A spokesperson for Cohen told E! News, “Mr. Cohen categorically denies Asia Argento’s accusation of assault against him as absolutely false. When they worked together, they had an excellent working relationship and Mr. Cohen considered her a friend, so this claim dating back to 2002 is bewildering, especially given what has been reported about her in recent years.”

The spokesperson did not elaborate on any specific reports about Argento.

Argento, who also went public with allegations of sexual assault against Harvey Weinstein in 2017, stated that she wanted to come forward now about Cohen as other women have also accused him of assault.

In February 2019, Cohen’s daughter Valkyrie Weather took to Twitter to claim that he molested her when she was 2-years-old, as well as took her to visit sex workers as a teenager. The accusations were also brought up in divorce proceedings put forth by Weather’s mother Dianna Mitzner 20 years earlier. Weather also claimed her father raped a woman. 

“My mother witnessed one of the assaults when I was between two and two and a half years old, and has since confirmed what she saw,” Weather tweeted. “This fact has cost me more than I could ever convey here. Rob has also raped at least one other woman, in her sleep.”

Cohen denied the allegations put forth by Weather that month in The Hollywood Reporter. “I hope and pray that one day, my child will come into the realization that no matter what anyone says or tries to convince her was the case when she was a child, it is both untrue and unimaginable,” he said.