Natalie Portman Shoots Down Vili Fualaau’s ‘May December’ Criticism

May December stars Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore have weighed in on Vili Fualaau’s staunch criticism of their movie.

Fualaau, the ex-husband of convicted rapist May Kay Letourneau, told The Hollywood Reporter last week that he felt the film was a “ripoff of [his] original story” and that he was “offended by the entire project and the lack of respect given” to him.

May December, Portman told Entertainment Tonight, is “its own story—it’s not meant to be a biopic.” In the Todd Haynes film, Portman plays an actress assigned to portray Moore’s character, a woman who began a sexual relationship with, and later married, a seventh grader when she was in her thirties. The story resembles the controversy surrounding Fualaau’s marriage to Letourneau, his former sixth grade teacher; he was 12 when they struck up a sexual relationship. In 1997, Letourneau pleaded guilty to the second-degree child rape of Fualaau and served a seven-year stint in prison.

Read more at The Daily Beast.