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Sex and the City stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon and Kristin Davis have publicly lent support to the women who've accused actor Chris Noth of sexually assaulting them in separate encounters that took place in 2004 and 2015. Noth starred alongside Parker, Nixon and Davis as Mr Big in the hit-show Sex and the City from 1998 to 2004.

In a joint statement released on social media on Tuesday, Parker, Nixon and Davis said they are "deeply saddened to hear the allegations". "We support the women who have come forward and shared their painful experiences," they said. "We know it must be a very difficult thing to do and we commend them for it."

Noth played Carrie Bradshaw's (Parker) love interest turned husband in the show as well as the two motion pictures in the Sex and the City franchise. He recently made an appearance in the ongoing Sex and the City reboot And Just Like That... albeit only in the first episode. The episode ended with Mr Big suffering a heart attack after an intense Peloton workout and dying in wife Carrie’s arms.

One woman, now 40, alleges she was assaulted in Noth’s Los Angeles apartment in 2004, when she was 22. She’d met Noth because he did business with the firm where she was employed. The other women, now 31 and a journalist, said she met Noth in 2015 when she was 25 and working as a server in the VIP section of a now-closed New York nightclub. She recounted crying and feeling “violated” when Noth abruptly initiated sex.

Sixty-seven-year-old Noth said in a statement that the encounters were consensual.

“The accusations against me made by individuals I met years, even decades, ago are categorically false. These stories could’ve been from 30 years ago or 30 days ago — no always means no — that is a line I did not cross,” Noth said.

“It’s difficult not to question the timing of these stories coming out. I don’t know for certain why they are surfacing now, but I do know this: I did not assault these women,” he added.