Hayden Panettiere Reveals More Details About ‘Famous’ Singer She Was Put into Bed with at 18

NEED TO KNOW

• In her memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning, Hayden Panettiere recalls being led into a room with a “famous thirtysomething British singer-songwriter” on a yacht

• Panettiere says a trusted friend encouraged her to get into bed with the singer before she fled the room and booked a hotel to leave

• The actress also reflected on the incident on Jay Shetty’s podcast, admitting she now realizes how vulnerable she was at 18

Hayden Panettiere shared further details about the yacht encounter from when she was 18 that she recently described as “shocking.”

Earlier this month, while on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast, Panettiere recalled being placed into bed beside an “undressed,” “very famous” man aboard a yacht by a friend she deeply trusted.

In her memoir This Is Me: A Reckoning, published on Tuesday, May 19, Panettiere provides additional insight into the experience in a chapter titled “Trust.”

According to Panettiere, the incident occurred during a trip to the South of France aboard what she describes as a “super yacht” filled with celebrities, parties and nonstop champagne. At the time, she says she was traveling with a woman she considered one of her closest confidantes.

She recalls spending days enjoying life aboard the yacht — swimming in the Mediterranean, dancing until sunrise and mingling with glamorous guests — before the situation suddenly took a dark turn.

Credit: Grand Central Publishing

Toward the end of the trip, Panettiere says her friend approached her during dinner and asked her to come downstairs to meet someone.

After walking through a narrow hallway and into a private cabin, Panettiere says she discovered a “famous thirtysomething British singer-songwriter” shirtless in bed under sheets.

“‘Oh my God,’ I thought. ‘Is he naked under there?'” she writes, claiming her trusted friend whispered to her, “I want you to get in bed with him,” before leaving them alone in the room.

Though she writes that she initially complied in shock, Panettiere says she immediately began to mentally disconnect from the situation.

Hayden Panettiere on March 6, 2023
Credit: ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty

“My body no longer felt like my own,” she recalls in the memoir, explaining that years of being “managed” by adults in the entertainment industry had conditioned her to trust people around her and suppress her instincts.

“As soon as the door clicked close, my survival instinct kicked in,” she writes. She says she told the man: “Look … I don’t know what she said to you, but this is not going to happen,” before leaving the room.

The actress says she quickly climbed out of bed, ran from the room and returned to her cabin, where she booked a hotel and began packing to leave the yacht. “I felt like I’d been kicked in the face,” she writes, adding that the experience left her feeling used and deeply betrayed by someone she trusted. “She’d confided in me, pampered me and treated me like her best friend — then turned around and treated me like a call girl,” Panettiere writes.

Hayden Panettiere in 2007
Credit: Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic

During her podcast appearance with Shetty, Panettiere reflected on how differently she views the experience now as an adult.

“The fact that I was 18, even though I’d lived such a huge life and I thought I was oh so mature at 18 … scientifically, your frontal lobes don’t develop until we’re what, 25, 26?” she said. “So even though I felt like I could make healthy decisions, safe decisions, I wasn’t capable of being fully aware of what was going on around me.”

She also admitted she initially had no warning signs that the situation was about to become dangerous. “There was no hints of anything like that happening,” she said. “So it took me by surprise.”

Panettiere added that once she realized she was in danger, her entire perspective shifted. “There was no jumping off and swimming away,” she added on the podcast. “And there was nobody who was going to be empathetic to my situation. I realized that this was nothing new to them.”

Panettiere recently explained why she chose not to name certain people in her book. When asked by The Hollywood Reporter, she said, “Because it was a bad look for them and [the people I didn’t name] were generally people within my industry. They’re people I could run into again. I didn’t want to put myself in that position. Things happened a long time ago, but it was to protect me and my company from being sued by some very pissed-off famous people.”

This Is Me: A Reckoning by Hayden Panettiere is available now, wherever books are sold.

Read the original article on People