In 2016, Newton stated she had been the victim of a director who repeatedly showed his friends a video of her in a sexually-graphic audition which she made as a teenager. Newton cited this experience as being a part of why she had taken the "Westworld" role, which involved substantial nudity, as it mirrored the experiences of survivors of sexual abuse while also asking moral questions about the meaning of humanity and what it means to be humane. In 2018, Newton said she was disappointed not to have been invited to participate in Time's Up, a movement against sexual harassment, considering that she had experienced being "ostracised" for speaking out about alleged sexual abuse by a director.