Celebrated composer Danny Elfman settled sexual harassment lawsuit for $830K: report – New York Post

News

By Patrick Reilly

July 20, 2023 | 12:48am

Celebrated composer Danny Elfman settled a sexual assault with former friend and composer Nomi Abadi in 2018 for a whopping $830,000 after she accused him of multiple instances of sexual harassment, according to a report.

Now she is suing Elfman again, claiming that he failed to make two installments worth $42,500 in each July 2019 and 2021 as required by terms of the settlement, Rolling Stone reported.

Elfman, 70, and Abadi, 35, met in 2015, according to the lawsuit, and the pair became fast friends. 

In November 2017, however, the former child prodigy who had performed with orchestras since the age of 5, filed a report with the Los Angeles Police Department accusing Elfman of “indecent exposure,” the magazine reported.

For over a year, Elfman had exposed his genitals in front of her and masturbated multiple times without her consent, Abadi claimed.

Elfman denied the allegations in a lengthy statement to Rolling Stone.

He said their relationship was platonic, and Abadi became frustrated with him after he declined her romantic advances.

“How do I respond to accusations so serious that being innocent is not a valid defense? It is excruciating to consider that a 50-year career may be destroyed in one news cycle as a result of vicious and wholly false allegations about sexual misconduct,” he said in a statement to the magazine. 

“Ms. Abadi’s allegations are simply not true. I allowed someone to get close to me without knowing that I was her ‘childhood crush’ and that her intention was to break up my marriage and replace my wife. When this person realized that I wanted distance from her, she made it clear that I would pay for having rejected her,” continued Elfman, who has been married to former actress Bridget Fonda since 2003.

“I allowed an ill-advised friendship to have far-reaching consequences, and that error in judgment is entirely my fault. I have done nothing indecent or wrong, and my lawyers stand ready to prove with voluminous evidence that these accusations are false. This is the last I will say on this subject,” he said.

A representative for the Oingo Boingo frontman subsequently told Rolling Stone that all of Elfman and Abadi’s “limited interactions” did not involve sexual contact and “were fully consensual.”

The initial settlement five years ago was in response to the #MeToo movement, the rep said.

Abadi declined to comment, but her attorney said: “It is ironic that Mr. Elfman’s current statements are directly contrary to the position he maintained in the underlying dispute and to the evidentiary record.”

The complaint claims that the missing $85,000 payments tied not to Abadi’s personal payments, but to cash for an unnamed charitable foundation she established with some of the settlement money, according to Rolling Stone.

Just days before this year’s Grammys, Abadi spoke to reporters at a press conference representing the Female Composer Safety League (FCSL), a nonprofit organization she launched in 2020.

While she did not call out Elfman by name in her remarks, the Recording Academy member refused to vote this year after seeing the list of nominees, among which was Elfman.

“I saw the names of [alleged] abusers who were nominated for Grammys this year, and I was unable to bring myself to vote,” Abadi said at the press conference. “I simply cannot fathom the idea of going along with an industry that allows silence-breakers to be vilified, or participating in a voting process that lauds abusers while some of us are barred from career opportunities because we spoke out.

She called for an end to nondisclosure agreements that prevent victims of sexual misconduct from speaking out.

Elfman, whose prolific career includes four Oscar nominations, two Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award and seven Saturn Awards for Best Music, is known for his Hollywood scores and numerous projects with Tim Burton, including “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” “Edward Scissorhands,” “Sleepy Hollow,” “Big Fish” and “Alice in Wonderland.”

He also composed the theme from “The Simpsons.”