Mr Macron’s comments were in stark contrast to those by Rima Abdul Malak, the culture minister, who last week said the actor “shamed France” after footage emerged of him making lewd and sexist comments.
She said that the grand chancery of the Legion of Honour would initiate a “disciplinary procedure” to decide whether to strip him of the award.
The controversy has reignited soul-searching in French cinema over its alleged tolerance of abusive and sexist behaviour.
In the interview, Mr Macron said: “You can accuse someone, there may be victims, but there is also a presumption of innocence.
“I simply want Gerard Depardieu to be able to defend his rights like everyone else… to continue to work and create,” he added.
Broadcaster France 2 aired a documentary earlier this month which showed the actor on a 2018 trip to North Korea, during which he repeatedly made explicit sexual comments in the presence of a female interpreter and sexualised a 10-year-old girl while she was riding a horse.
Mr Depardieu, an actor with more than 200 films to his name, was charged with rape in 2020 and has been accused of sexual harassment and assault by more than a dozen women.
He has strenuously denied all of the allegations.
A torrent of outrage
Mr Macron’s comments unleashed a torrent of outrage.
Sophie Bussiere, a spokesperson for the Greens, issued a social media post depicting the president as “promoter in chief of rape culture”.
Francois Hollande, France’s former Socialist president, said: “We’re not proud of Gerard Depardieu.
“It was expected of the president to talk about women, not just that Gerard Depardieu was a great actor,” he added.
“[Macron] has dubbed [women’s rights] the most important issue of his five-year term, and this is how he is dealing with the Gerard Depardieu question.”
Anne-Cecile Mailfert, the president of the Women’s Foundation, said: “When the president says ‘I won’t take part in a manhunt’, he is judging the women who have filed complaints or who have given evidence by saying that they are the ones whose stance is reprehensible.
“This is extremely serious. Emmanuel Macron has a voice that carries weight, and this has real consequences for women’s lives,” she added.
Since the documentary aired Mr Depardieu’s family has denounced an “unprecedented conspiracy” against him.
Mr Depardieu himself addressed the rape and sexual assault allegations in an open letter published in Le Figaro in October.
“Never, ever have I abused a woman,” the actor wrote. “To the media court, to the lynching that has been reserved for me, I have only my word to defend myself.”
Over the weekend, a Belgian municipality stripped Mr Depardieu of the title of honorary citizen, several days after the Canadian province of Quebec revoked its top honour over his “scandalous” comments about women.
But Mr Depardieu’s family has argued his treatment amounts to a public lynching.
“Of course, we are often shocked by Gerard’s comments, but our father/grandfather/uncle is being the target of an unprecedented conspiracy,” several relatives, including his daughter, actress Julie Depardieu, said in a letter published in French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.
Deploring “this terrifying collective insanity”, they said that “in private, with his children, he is an extremely modest, delicate and even prudish person.”
Meanwhile, Paris’s Grevin Museum has withdrawn a life-size waxwork of Mr Depardieu, which had been on display at the wax museum since 1981.
The statue was removed “following the negative reactions of visitors” passing in front of it, as well as comments “on social media”, it said.
