The woman, who worked for MTV at the time, said she initially had 'banter' with Brand about an 'I Am Spartacus' T-shirt he was wearing before offering to show him the way to the toilets. Once there, she told the jury, his demeanour changed.
'He went from someone jovial and friendly to suddenly turning into this wild-eyed maniac trying to pull me into the toilet,' she said, adding that he grabbed her forearm with a 'hard, forceful grip' and leaned into the door. She said she told him: 'What are you doing? Are you mad? Let me go.'
She said Brand then began to plead, 'go on, go on, come in', but she managed to pull herself free after about 20 seconds. 'He didn't manage to rape me,' she said. 'I emerged relatively unscathed.'
The woman said she told two colleagues what had happened but did not report the incident to police until after seeing a 2023 documentary that accused Brand of sexual misconduct. 'It brought everything back,' she told the court. 'I thought I'd managed to get away. It could've been very different.'
Under cross-examination, defence barrister Ian Winter KC suggested the woman had reassessed her memory of the incident after watching the documentary. She rejected this, saying: 'It would have been my word against his, I had a job to consider, I emerged relatively unscathed. He didn't manage to rape me. I managed to get myself out of the situation.'
Winter also suggested Brand had 'invited' her into the toilet for a consensual sexual encounter. The woman replied: 'You don't drag someone by the arm, not in my world anyway. You don't grip someone to drag them in, that's not consensual.'
The court also heard evidence from Andrew Dobson, a former flatmate of Brand's who composed music for a fringe cabaret show. Dobson described Brand as 'a very vibrant character, very egotistical' and said 'sex was a huge preoccupation for him'.
The trial continues.