Tyler Perry is reportedly being sued by The Oval actor Derek Dixon, who is accusing the Hollywood mogul of alleged sexual assault and years of harassment.
Dixon, an actor who plays Dale on Perry’s long-running TV show, The Oval, claims he was at n event in 2019, when the Hollywood picked him out of the crowd and asked for his phone number, implying he may have a role for him, according to the lawsuit, obtained by TMZ.
The actor noted that Perry did, in fact, have a role for him, as he went on to appear in two episodes of the 2020-2021 television series, Ruthless. Moreover, the television series is Dixon’s first acting credit, according to his IMDb page.
But in his lawsuit, Dixon accuses Perry of inviting him to his Atlanta home in January 2020, saying that he accepted, hoping to build a friendship that would lead to more acting roles.
While at Perry’s residence, however, Dixon drank too much and ended up going to sleep in a guest room, at which point the Hollywood mogul climbed into bed with him and began touching his thighs, the lawsuit alleges.
Dixon claims that he rejected Perry all night, but that the director persisted.
After that, Dixon was cast in The Oval, playing Dale, who was written as a gay, homeless, and desperate man working as a store clerk and feeling it necessary to sleep with other characters in order to have a place to stay, the actor noted in his lawsuit, claiming that Perry had told him this type of character was exactly what he was looking for in a real-life sexual partner.
Around the time he was playing Dale on The Oval, Dixon had also begun receiving sexually suggestive texts from Perry, including questions relating to sexual preferences and disclosing that he has sex with men, the actor alleges in his lawsuit.
Due to fear of derailing his budding acting career as a result of outright rejecting Perry, Dixon said he told the director he wasn’t “the sexual type,” and never complained about sexual harassment, thinking he would lose his job, the complaint states.
The lawsuit goes on to accuse Perry of again inviting Dixon to his Atlanta home in 2020, to which the actor obliged, and then asking him if he “likes it rough in bed,” before grabbing Dixon by the throat, adding, “Look how excited you just got.”
Years of text messages allegedly sent by between both Perry and Dixon are reportedly included in the lawsuit, which the Hollywood mogul’s team is calling a “scam.”
“No straight man would be going on walks with you or cooking dinner for you unless they wanted to fuck you. I would fuck you,” one alleged text sent from Perry to Dixon read, according to the lawsuit.
In June 2021, Dixon was again at Perry’s home — in a guest house wearing only his underwear — when the director allegedly came in to give him a goodnight hug, TMZ reported of the actor’s claims.
Dixon claims Perry pulled down his underwear, groped his buttocks, and said, “Relax and just let it happen,” before insisting it wouldn’t hurt. The actor added that he somehow managed to snub Perry’s advance by changing the subject.
In June 2024, Dixon filed a complaint with Equal Employment and Opportunity Commission, and then quit The Oval, citing he was done putting up with sexual harassment, the lawsuit says.
Dixon is reportedly seeking $260 million in damages in a lawsuit against both Perry and his production company, Tyler Perry Studios. The actor is suing for workplace sexual harassment, sexual assault, and battery.
“This is an individual who got close to Tyler Perry for what now appears to be nothing more than setting up a scam,” Perry’s attorney, Matthew Boyd, told TMZ, adding, “But Tyler will not be shaken down and we are confident these fabricated claims of harassment will fail.”
Alana Mastrangelo is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Facebook and X at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.
