In a new interview, Molly Shannon discusses a frightening encounter she allegedly had with the late Gary Coleman.
When she appeared on Howard Stern’s show, Molly Shannon talked about the first time she met Coleman, a point in time she also recounted in her new memoir, Hello, Molly!
Shannon had just decided to sign with the Diff’rent Strokes star’s representative and was given the opportunity to meet him at the time. Shannon claims she was invited to Coleman’s top floor hotel room along with their shared agent.
But, as Shannon told Stern, the mood changed once the agent left her alone with Coleman. Coleman, according to Shannon, asked her sit on the bed and then began tickling her.
“I was trying to be polite and stuff, I’m a polite Catholic girl — and a virgin,” Shannon said. Shannon stated Coleman tried to kiss her and climb on top of her several times. “He was relentless,” she said.
“I would get off the bed, then he would bounce on the bed — jump jump jump jump — then he would wrap himself around me and I would fling him off,” Shannon recounted.
“I guess because of his size, I didn’t feel physically threatened,” she explained. However, “I’m getting really out of breath because it was like athletic and aerobic.”
Shannon claimed she attempted to flee to the restroom, but Coleman snagged her leg. She said she was able to shake him off and lock herself in the bathroom.
She said she eventually “sprinted” out of the hotel room.
Coleman was about 4’8 when he died in 2010 at the age of 42.
