For six seasons, Loss It was a game-changing hit for ABC – helping to redefine the rules of television as a tool. However, behind the scenes, some of the people working on the show have described its creative environment as “brutal, brutal, destructive, racist, sexist, bullying, angry, abusive and hostile”.
These identifiers and more, by journalist Maureen Ryan Loss showrunner Damon Lindelof and executive producer Carlton Cuse promoting his upcoming book Burn It Down: A Call for Power, Complexity and Change in Hollywood. While Lindelof admits that he “failed” in creating a “safe” work environment at the time, he also says he doesn’t remember certain claims from Ryan’s book; Show Fair It was published on Tuesday.
The quote contains a number of claims from the ancients. Loss Writers and actors who claim the show is uniquely poisonous – thanks in particular to an atmosphere where racist humor allegedly helps determine who is “in” and who is “out” in the writers’ room. “Looks like the show was bothered by the cleaning staff using the bathroom. Loss offices,” writes Ryan, “and there were ‘jokes’ about putting up a ‘Whites Only sign’.”
author Monica Owusu-Breen working on Lossseason three described it as the most “openly hostile” workplace of his career. “There was no way to navigate this situation,” he told Ryan, and part of the problem was “they really didn’t like their colorful characters.” As another unnamed source put it, “I felt like every road was blocked except accepting cruelty, sexism and racist comment.”
Actor Harold Perrineau told Ryan of his disappointment that he was deleted in Season 2 after his character Michael, a single Black father who voiced his concerns for his kidnapped son, Walt, dared to ask for more lines. In one scenario that became a flashpoint, Perrineau recalled that Michael was with another (white) character, Sawyer, and spent the rest of the episode focusing entirely on Sawyer after his character mentioned once about his own son – “but never mentioned Walt again. ”
“I don’t think I can do that,” Perrineau remembered thinking. “I can’t be anyone else who doesn’t mind kidnapping Black children, even in a fictional context, can I? This furthers the narrative that nobody cares about Black boys, not even Black fathers.
Perrineau told Ryan that he had raised his concerns to Lindelof and Cuse, who did not seem to agree with him, and that the episode was not about him. Then, weeks before the end of Season 2, Perrineau learned that her character would not be returning (though the actor later returned as a guest in several episodes of Season 4).
Multiple sources told Ryan that Lindelof joked about Perrineau’s dismissal by saying, “He called me a racist, so I fired your ass.” Ryan said he doesn’t remember Lindelof saying that “ever”. “And I’ll admit the events you’re describing happened 17 years ago and I don’t know why anyone would make that up about me.”
At one point during their conversation, Ryan reported that Lindelof was addressing the word cloud directly. “Would it shock you to learn or believe that despite the fact that I totally and completely confirmed your word cloud, I was largely unaware, unaware, of the negative effects I had on others in that writers room the entire time? Do you think I did?”
This guard And Miss Davis The creator added: “The way I treat myself and the other people for whom I am responsible and overseen is a byproduct of all the mistakes that have been made. I have developed and grown considerably, and it should not have come at the expense of and traumatized by the people I hurt. Loss”
With LossRyan’s book will tell more behind-the-scenes stories from popular shows like: Saturday night live, goldbergsAnd Curb the enthusiasm. The book hits shelves on June 6th.