Sharon Stone Says ‘Basic Instinct’ Impacted Her Child Custody Agreement: ‘It Broke My Heart’
Sharon Stone is speaking out on how erotic thriller “Basic Instinct” impacted her son’s life.
The Oscar nominee alleged that starring in the 1992 film led to her losing out on a custody agreement with ex-husband Phil Bronstein over their adopted son Roan. The divorce was finalized in 2004.
“I lost custody of my child,” Stone said during iHeartPodcast “Table for Two with Bruce Bozzi” episode, citing her controversial reputation following the infamous “Basic Instinct” nude scene. “When the judge asked my child — my tiny little boy, ‘Do you know your mother makes sex movies?’ Like, this kind of abuse by the system — that I was considered what kind of parent I was, because I made that movie.”
Stone continued, “People are walking around with no clothes on at all on regular TV now and you saw maybe like a 16th of a second of possible nudity of me — and I lost custody of my child. Are you kidding?”
The “Casino” star revealed that the judge’s decision led to her being admitted to the Mayo Clinic due to “extra heartbeats in the upper and lower chambers” of her heart.
“It broke my heart. It literally broke my heart,” Stone said of the custody battle.
The affect of “Basic Instinct” on Stone’s professional life also led to a “horrible” reception by her peers, namely after being “laughed” at during the Golden Globes when her name was read for Best Actress for the role.
“It was horrible! I was so humiliated!” Stone shared. “And I [thought], ‘Does anybody have any idea how hard it was to play that part? How gut-wrenching and frightening, and how much work it was to play this part right and kind of try to carry this complex movie that was really breaking all boundaries, and everybody was protesting against – and the pressure?'”
Stone wrote in her 2021 memoir that she was misled over the “vagina-shot” interrogation sequence in the film, saying director Paul Verhoeven assured her she was covered up.
“That was how I saw my vagina-shot for the first time, long after I’d been told, ‘We can’t see anything — I just need you to remove your panties, as the white is reflecting the light, so we know you have panties on,'” Stone penned. “Now, here is the issue. It didn’t matter anymore. It was me and my parts up there. I had decisions to make.”
Stone said that she confronted Verhoeven later. “I went to the projection booth, slapped Paul across the face, left, went to my car, and called my lawyer, Marty Singer. Marty told me that they could not release this film as it was. That I could get an injunction. First, at that time, this would give the film an X rating,” Stone wrote. “Remember, this was 1992, not now, when we see erect penises on Netflix. And, Marty said, per the Screen Actors Guild, my union, it wasn’t legal to shoot up my dress in this fashion. Whew, I thought…For heaven’s sake, I fought for that part, and all that time, only this director had stood up for me.”
Verhoeven denied the allegation, saying, “She knew exactly what we were doing.”