Amy Heckerling’s Daughter Defends ‘Consensual’ Chris Kattan Relationship, Blames Lorne Michaels
(From left) Chris Kattan, Lorne Michaels, Amy Heckerling Image by Getty/Forward Montage
Update: This article has been updated to include a quote from a spokesperson for Saturday Night Live.
Mollie Heckerling, daughter of writer-director Amy Heckerling, has spoken out against claims made by Chris Kattan that framed her mother as having been sexually predatory in a work environment.
Kattan, a longtime Saturday Night Live actor, wrote in his new memoir “Baby Don’t Hurt Me: Stories and Scars from Saturday Night Live” that while in production for the movie “A Night At The Roxbury,” Heckerling approached him for sex. Kattan wrote that he thought of Heckerling as his “boss” and was scared when “Roxbury” producer and SNL show runner Lorne Michaels seemed to suggest that Kattan should keep Heckerling “happy” with sex.
“I was attracted to Amy,” he writes. “But at the same time I was very afraid of the power she and Lorne wielded over my career.”
Neither Heckerling nor Michaels have given a public statement about Kattan’s claims. A spokesperson for SNL told Page Six, of Kattan’s story, “This did not happen.” But Heckerling’s daughter took to Twitter on Wednesday to “weigh in” on the situation. “Here’s what I remember,” the 33-year-old wrote. She acknowledged that her mother and Kattan had an affair during the making of the 1998 movie, but explained, “Was it inappropriate considering the power dynamics? YES. But, was it consensual and fully his choice to get involved with her? Also, YES.”
I would like the chance to weigh in on the situation regarding @ChrisKattan and my mother.
Here’s what I remember: pic.twitter.com/3D3BVrPgx7— Mollie Heckerling (@mollieschmollie) May 29, 2019
Heckerling writes that during the time that her mother and Kattan were involved, the comedian told her mother that Lorne Michaels had said, “Why would you want to date her for? She’s so old.” Heckerling’s insecurity about her age, her daughter said, caused her to “spiral into a massive eating disorder.”
“I feel for Chris’s other struggles, and certainly don’t want to delegitimize the importance of the #MeToo movement, but what Chris is saying feels very libelous,” Mollie Heckerling wrote.
Jenny Singer is the deputy life/features editor for the Forward. You can reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter @jeanvaljenny
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