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Dame Joan Collins on This Morning ITV

Dame Joan Collins has opened up about sexual harassment during her heyday in Hollywood on This Morning today (16 October) in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal.

The 84-year-old silver screen legend graced the morning programme to speak about her negative personal experiences as a 17-year-old starlet in the 1950s.

Collins shocked Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield when she revealed that she was forced to hide in a wardrobe and frequently escaped the "clutches" of naked producers.

She also divulged the advice Marilyn Monroe offered her, warning her to watch out for the "wolves in Hollywood" and that she would be dropped if she didn't give bosses "what they want".

She said: "When I finally got my first audition for first big role at Ealing Studios, I would get on bus, train, then walk. One of the producers always used to try and catch me. And push me up against the wall, stroke my arm.

"He was tall and smelly and horrible and I would push him away. I wouldn't think this had anything to do with the part. One day he finally caught me. The wonderful dresser hid me in the wardrobe. Shortly after that he did get me.

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1954: Marilyn Monroe warned Joan Collins about "wolves in Hollywood" Getty

"I finally got in the car with him, he said he'd give me a lift. He behaved, I know that children are watching, totally inappropriately. He had undone himself and taken my hand. I just said no it's horrible. He kind of laughed at me and called me something rather rude, 'frigid little b'.

"And he said I won't get the role and asked if I wanted it. I said 'yes I really do'. He insinuated if I didn't go along with what he was doing I wouldn't get it. Luckily the director, a lovely man, wanted me so I got the role. But I had to escape from his clutches all the time," she continued.

Collins claimed in the candid interview that she was once humiliated by two "famous megastars" at a party who pulled down her top.

Speaking about a further incident, she said: "He did grab me in the corridor, very inappropriate, hissing in my ear. Smelling of cigarette smoke and BO, said the most horrible vile things to me.

"He had in his office a gold paperweight made of his nether regions which was supposedly the stuff of legend. I don't want to know that legend."

Collins also spoke about nearly landing Liz Taylor's role in Cleopatra alongside Richard Burton, and that the movie part was "dangled like a cherry" as the men trying to sexually harass her were "fat, old and hideous".

She hinted that Hollywood has to yet more dark secrets amid the Weinstein scandal, adding: "I think a lot of people, not only in Hollywood, but in the British film industry are quaking in their boots. Not only is it endemic its acceptance. I have a grandchild who wants to be in showbiz and I don't want her to have to go through what I had to go through."