The director of Scream VII has aired his thoughts about the firing of Melissa Barerra, a lead actor in the Scream franchise, following her social media posts about Palestine and Israel.
Mexican actor Barrera, who also starred in In the Heights and the drama series Vida, was cut from the horror films after production company Spyglass Media aired their dissatisfaction with her comments on social media.
She played main character Sam Carpenter, the elder sister of Jenna Ortega’s Tara Carpenter, in the fifth and sixth Scream films, Scream (2022) and Scream VI (2023). Barrera was expected to reprise her role in the next offering, although no casting decisions had been announced prior to now.
Following the news of Barrera’s exit, Christopher Landon shared his feelings on the situation with a short post on X, formerly Twitter.
“This is my statement,” he began, before posting an emoji of a broken heart on Tuesday (21 November). “Everything sucks. Stop yelling. This was not my decision to make.”
Landon later deleted the post, which was made on his account, @creetureshow. The Independent has reached out to a representative of Christopher Landon for comment.
Christopher Landon and Melissa Barrera— (Getty)
According to a report by Variety on Tuesday (21 November), Barerra was “quietly dropped” from the film due to her social media posts.
Sources told the publication that the decision was made after she referred to Israel as a “colonised” land and floated an antisemitic trope that Jews control the media, writing: “Western media only shows the [Israeli] side. Why do they do that, I will let you deduce for yourself.”
Melissa Barrera did not respond immediately to The Independent’s request for comment.
In a statement released to Variety, a spokesperson for Spyglass Media said: “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.”
The news of Barrera’s firing comes as it was reported that Susan Sarandon had been dropped by her talent agency UTA for comments she made at a pro-Palestine rally in New York City on 17 November.
“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,” the Thelma and Louise actor reportedly said.
