A FORMER personal assistant of Laurence Fishburne is suing the Matrix star for dismissing her — allegedly because she became a single mother.
Kristal Crews claims that the actor, who played Keanu Reeves’s mentor, Morpheus, in The Matrix and its sequels, told her he did not believe “in women having children on their own”.
Miss Crews says she was hired in November 1999 to take charge of Fishburne’s “personal and business needs” but was dismissed after she announced that she was expecting a baby.
According to the claim, Mr Fishburne “initially expressed happiness and agreed to be the baby’s godfather” when she told him the news in April 2004. But his attitude changed after she told him she would be unable to go to New Orleans for a film shoot.
He allegedly told her he “could not understand why she had not come to him before she made the decision to become pregnant” and “that there were consequences to her decision to have the baby without consulting him”.
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“In short, Fishburne viewed the plaintiff as his property and not as an employee who had a right to privacy, as well as legal rights in the context of her employment,” the suit says.
Miss Crews says she worked for Fishburne on the day she gave birth, a month early, in November 2004, when stress forced her to have an emergency Caesarean section. She took maternity leave and was told that she would be dismissed effective from the day she was scheduled to return in last January, court papers say.
The lawsuit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, seeks unspecified damages for breach of contract, sex discrimination and wrongful termination in violation of public policy.
Fishburne, 44, a former child star on television, has an illustrious screen career that began at the age of 14 with an appearance in Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now and includes Death Wish II, The Color Purple, Othello and his breakthrough role in Boyz n the Hood.
The actor insisted that he had always treated Miss Crews in a “fair and professional manner” and denied the allegations.
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Fishburne’s lawyer said: “It is unfortunate that the visibility of actors causes people to say all kinds of things about them for what we can only assume are their own purposes.
“We are confident that (he) will be vindicated in these proceedings.”