Word on the street is that actress Melissa Barrera has been dropped from Scream VII due to her political comments regarding the war between Israel and Hamas.
via: Deadline
Sources say that this is due to the reposts in her Instagram stories that have been perceived as antisemitic.
“Spyglass’ stance is unequivocally clear: We have zero tolerance for antisemitism or the incitement of hate in any form, including false references to genocide, ethnic cleansing, Holocaust distortion or anything that flagrantly crosses the line into hate speech,” reads a statement from a rep.
Scream 7 director Christopher Landon weighed in with the following on Barrera’s firing by the studio: “This is my statement: Everything sucks. Stop yelling. This was not my decision to make.”
There have been screen captures of her IG stories online. See below.
A month ago, Barrera posted on her IG story a placard that read “I too come from a colonized country” with a Mexican flag logo. “Palestine WILL be free” it continued to read with an italicized quote: “they tried to bury us, they didn’t know we were seeds.”
She also posted the following to her IG stories:
Spyglass Media did not return request for comment on the firing of Barrera.
While there have been no hard castings announced about the film post-actors strike, and Christopher Landon reportedly is directing the next installment, we hear that Barrera was set to reprise her role as Sam Carpenter, sister of Jenna Ortega’s Tara Carpenter.
Paramount has been the theatrical distributor of the two most recent Scream movies, the last one being the highest-grossing of all stateside with over $108M, and an overall global take of $169M.
Barrera rose to fame on Starz’s series Vida before winning a lead role in Warner Bros. feature musical In the Heights and continuing on to the Scream franchise for two movies.
Earlier today, Oscar winner Susan Sarandon was dropped by her agency UTA after she made controversial comments at a pro-Palestine rally in New York on November 17.
Sarandon reportedly said at the rally, “There are a lot of people that are afraid, that are afraid of being Jewish at this time, and are getting a taste of what it feels like to be a Muslim in this country, so often subjected to violence.”
So the message that Hollywood is sending their actors is that if you have an opinion different than the people of Israel, you will not work in the industry.
No one can have empathy for the thousands of Palestinian men, women and children who are not a part of Hamas being killed daily by the Israeli government.
In regards to Susan Sarandon, who has always been politicallyoutspoken being dropped by her talent agency, call me crazy but I don't think what she said was antisemitic.
What I took from what she was saying is that the Jewish community has never had to endure the amount of hate and vitriol that Muslim people have been going through until the world started to realize the true history of the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
I don't want to go down a deep political rabbit hole, but with Melissa no longer being part of the franchise, the question now remains what does the future hold for the franchise? Do we scrap the entire Carpenter story, as well as the core three (Jenna Ortega, Mason Gooding and Jasmine Savoy-Brown?)
Do we make Ortega's Tara Carpenter the focal character since she has become the bigger name in Hollywood? How will they explain Sam's absence from Scream 7 if the core three returns? Speaking of Ortega, she has also stated that she stands with the people of Palestine. So does that mean producers of the film are going to fire her too? Or are the rules different because like In stated earlier she's the bigger Hollywood name on the tip of everyone's tongue.
Will Scream VII director Christopher Landon and Paramount/Spyglass back up the Brinks truck in order to bring the franchise's original scream queen Neve Campbell back? The fans love Sidney Prescott, but if you bring her back you really need to make her a significant part of the film, and not some bonafide cameo.
I personally feel that they need to start fresh with an entire new cast of characters, since I feel that Scream VI gave us an conclusive ending. Sam dropping the Ghostface mask on the ground was symbolic of Sam not letting the sins of her father Billy Loomis define her as a person.
Since this is the game Paramount wants to play, with a whole new director on board just start from scratch.
Comments