Will & Grace delivers powerful #MeToo storyline for Debra Messing's character

In Thursday's episode of the sitcom, Grace tells her father she was sexually assaulted at the age of 15

Warning: the following piece contains mild spoilers about the fifth episode of the 10th season of Will & Grace.

Will & Grace delivered a powerful Me Too storyline on Thursday night, in a poignant scene that saw Debra Messing's character tell her father she was sexually assaulted at the age of 15.

In the episode, titled Grace's Secret, Grace and her father, played by Robert Klein, share a meal at a diner. There, her father Martin flirts with the waitress, calling her "sweetheart" and telling her she should be "on the menu".

Grace, visibly annoyed, asks Martin why he acts that way, to which he responds by claiming women "love it".

"They don't love it," Grace shoots back, at which point Martin complains that "everyone is so sensitive nowadays" and that he feels as though "men can't be men anymore".

Grace tries to shut down the conversation, telling Marting they should just eat their meal before going to the cemetery to visit her mother's grave.

"And Harry," Martin adds in reference to his late best friend, who is buried at the same site.

Grace then firmly refuses to go to Harry's tombstone. When Martin reminds her Harry was his best friend, she responds: "Well, he wasn't mine."

What follows is a dialogue that will resonate with the many people who have come forward about their own assaults.

The father, apparently frustrated by his daughter's reluctance to honour Harry's memory – and clueless as to what her reasons may be – tells Grace he's never understood "this thing she has" about Harry, and reminds her he once got her "a good job" working for his best friend.

"The whole summer that I worked for Harry, I kept telling you he was creepy. What did you think that meant?" Grace asks.

Martin makes excuses for his friend, claiming "it was a different time". The conversation escalates until Grace is ready to walk out as her father insists the incident "doesn't sound like Harry", who was a "good guy".

"Maybe you're misremembering," Harry suggests.

Grace responds: "No. No. I remember. I remember every single thing that happened that day."

Now, Martin "doesn't want to talk about it", but it's too late. Grace sits back down and shows him that indeed, she does remember, down to the very last detail.

"It was hot so I had to have my hair up. And it showed off the earrings that I borrowed from mom that made me feel really grown up," she says. "And then at the end of the day, Harry called me into his office."

Martin, reluctant to hear his daughter's story, asks: "What are you talking about?" She continues: "I walked in. He shut the door. He closed the blinds. And then he pushed me up against the wall."

Again, Martin tries to interrupt, telling his daughter: "Gracie, no," but Grace doesn't back down. "I tried to scream," she continues, "but he told me 'Quiet.' Then he started kissing me and touching me and then he pulled down my pants, put his fingers up –"

Martin, at this point, yells: "Stop!" and buries his face in his hands.

"I was 15," Grace adds.

The father and daughter then sit in silence for a few moments, unable to look at each other, until the waitress returns to deliver a punchline (and the bad news that the diner has run out of shrimp salad).

The scene has been met with acclaim from viewers, who deemed it "powerful" and thought Messing's performance was "brilliant".

"My heart sank,' someone commented under a YouTube clip of the moment. "The pain she showed is the pain of thousands of girls and women who've stayed silent."

Messing herself shared the clip on Twitter, writing: "It's an honour to work on a show that makes people laugh but also isn't afraid to tackle bigger, deeper, more difficult and painful subjects.

"I'm so proud of the compassion and care that our entire team took to approach this episode, Grace’s Secret. Hopefully, telling this story can spark discussion and give us all new tools to communicate with. Please know that I see you, and I believe you."