Billy Connolly reportedly gave Russell Brand a "stern ticking off" on the set of a musical over the comedian's alleged inappropriate behaviour.
The Scottish icon is said to have given a few hard words to Brand when they were working on Eric Idle’s musical What About Dick? in 2012.
It has been claimed the Get Him To The Greek star harassed a wardrobe assistant, who was working on the musical, and allegedly asked her to flash her breasts and wouldn't return to work until she did.
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Billy, 80, is said to have heard about the incident and confronted Brand about his inappropriate behaviour. "Billy got annoyed when he found out and gave Russell a stern ticking off. Russell is a charming scoundrel and everybody let him get away with murder on set - except Billy."
The source told The Sun: "But after their heart-to-heart, he settled down and gave a great performance and filmed the scenes like a consummate professional." Years later, Brand hailed Billy "a true hero and pioneer" and "Glasgow’s finest trickster shaman" in an ITV documentary about Connolly's career.
Brand recently found himself at the centre of a joint investigation by The Times and Sunday Times and Channel 4’s documentary series Dispatches over the weekend. Four women accused him of rape, sexual assault and emotional abuse at the height of his fame. He recently shared a video statement denying 'criminal' and 'very serious' allegations, which he said had been put to him in the form of a letter and email from an unnamed television programme and newspaper.
Speaking on his TalkTV show, Piers Morgan has said he confronted Russell about being a ‘predator’ back in 2006, but admits he was only joking at the time. He shared details of a GQ interview he conducted at the time - which is also the period in time in which Brand was said to be dating a 16-year-old girl who has since claimed he sexually assaulted her. Discussing the interview, Piers said: "I asked, for reasons I’m not entirely sure other than it must have been jocular at the time, ‘Are you a more successful sexual predator now you don’t drink?‘ I meant it as a joke, I didn’t have any information about him actually being a sexual predator.
"He said ‘Yes, but I resent the word predator. I like to think of myself as a conduit of natural forces. After all, the most natural thing in the world for people to do is f**k, isn’t it? And people want to do it, so all you have to do is remove all the reasons why women don’t actually go through with it, like pride and reputation. You just have to unpick the conditions stopping women going straight to bed with you’."
In a statement shared on his YouTube and via The Sunday Times, Brand denied all allegations, saying: "I've received two extremely disturbing letters or a letter and an email. One from a mainstream media TV company, one from a newspaper listing a litany of extremely egregious and aggressive attacks, as well as some pretty stupid stuff like community festival should be stopped, that I shouldn't be able to attack mainstream media narratives on this channel.
"But amidst this litany of astonishing rather baroque attacks, often very serious allegations that I absolutely refute. These allegations pertain to the time when I was working in the mainstream when I was in the newspapers all the time when I was in the movies. And as I've written about extensively in my books, I was very, very promiscuous.
"Now, during that time of promiscuity, the relationships I had were absolutely always consensual. I was always transparent about that. Then almost too transparent, and I'm being transparent about it now as well. And to see that transparency metastasized into something criminal that I absolutely deny makes me question, is there another agenda at play?"
The Mirror has contacted Russell Brand and Billy Connolly's representatives for comment.
