Actor Harold Perrineau Accuses ‘Misplaced’ Producers of Firing Him for Wanting ‘Equal Depth’ as White Characters

In spite of everything these years of remaining quiet, actor Harold Perrineau is now accusing the producers of the hit 2000s drama Misplaced of firing him after he requested them to develop his character with “equal depth” as a few of the white characters had acquired.

Misplaced was an enormous hit for ABC for many of its six-year run from 2004 to 2010, and Perrineau was one of many better-known stars when the collection debuted. However, over time his character appeared much less and was in the end dropped.

Within the aftermath of a brand new ebook on the leisure trade’s poisonous tradition that claims Misplaced had a poisonous environment for minority actors, writers, and different workers, Perrineau is talking out to disclose his expertise on the hit TV present’s set, in keeping with Immediately.

Perrineau says that he favored the idea of Misplaced as a result of the story gave the impression to be “really equitable” by giving so many characters their time within the highlight. However quickly sufficient, he says he realized that his character, “Michael Dawson,” was not getting a lot display time.

“It became pretty clear that I was the Black guy. Daniel (Dae Kim) was the Asian guy. And then you had Jack and Kate and Sawyer,” Perrineau advised Immediately.

The racism was so blatant, he says, that every one the non-white actors had been consistently positioned on the winds and within the again throughout forged photograph shoots.

Perrineau claims he took his issues to the producers.

He mentioned he advised them, “I don’t have to be the first, I don’t have to have the most episodes — but I’d like to be in the mix. But it seems like this is now a story about Jack and Kate and Sawyer.”

He says that he was advised that Jack, Kate, and Sawyer had been “relatable” to audiences.

Perrineau mentioned the ultimate straw was a script for an episode the place Michael’s son, Walt, was lacking, however Michael solely mentions the problem as soon as and in any other case appeared unconcerned over his lacking son. He balked over the story and mentioned he couldn’t do it.

“I can’t be another person who doesn’t care about missing Black boys, even in the context of fiction, right? This is just furthering the narrative that nobody cares about Black boys, even Black fathers,” he mentioned he advised producers.

Perrineau claimed that he advised producers he was able to work, however needed to be a fleshed-out character, not simply “the black guy.” After the assembly, he did get a bit extra focus in an episode, however after that all of it went south shortly.

By the top of season two, Perrineau was advised his character was not returning. However, when he requested why, producers blamed him.

“‘Well, you know,’” Perrineau said the producers told him. “‘you said to us, if we don’t have something good for you, you need to go.’”

“I was just asking for equal depth,” Perrineau insisted. “It was all very much, ‘How dare you?’”

The ebook that prompted Perrineau’s claims, Maureen Ryan’s “Burn It Down: Power, Complicity, and a Call for Change in Hollywood,” additionally claimed that author and producer Monica Owusu-Breen felt that the collection had a poisonous tradition that was “nakedly hostile” and “relentlessly cruel,” and even claimed blacks had been “hazed” in the course of the present.

Damon Lindelof, showrunner for Misplaced, mentioned he was totally unaware of this poisonous tradition.

“My level of fundamental inexperience as a manager and a boss, my role as someone who was supposed to model a climate of creative danger and risk-taking but provide safety and comfort inside of the creative process—I failed in that endeavor,” Ryan claims Lindelof mentioned.

As to Perrineau’s grievance that he wasn’t getting used sufficient, Lindelof mentioned “Every single actor had expressed some degree of disappointment that they weren’t being used enough… That was kind of part and parcel for an ensemble show, but obviously there was a disproportionate amount of focus on Jack and Kate and Locke and Sawyer — the white characters. Harold was completely and totally right to point that out. It’s one of the things that I’ve had deep and profound regrets about in the two decades since,” Lindelof reportedly mentioned.

Producer Carlton Cuse additionally spoke out in regards to the accusations in Ryan’s ebook, saying, “It breaks my heart to hear it. It’s deeply upsetting to know that there were people who had such bad experiences. I did not know people were feeling that way,” Cuse mentioned in a press release. “No one ever complained to me, nor am I aware that anybody complained to ABC Studios. I wish I had known. I would have done what I could to make changes.”

Regardless, each Lindelof and Cuse insist that Perrineau was by no means fired and that one of many large causes for the restricted use of Michael and Walt was as a result of younger actor Malcolm David Kelley had a significant “growth spurt” in the course of the present and will not be portrayed as a pre-teen child. So, the characters tales had been wrapped up.

This isn’t the primary time that the present’s poisonous tradition has come underneath fireplace. J.J. Abrams, the co-creator and government producer of the present, issued a public apology to star Evangeline Lilly in 2018 after she got here out to say that she felt humiliated by the nude scene they compelled her to movie.

Lilly mentioned that she was pressured to do a nude scene for the present and resulting from her younger age felt unable to face up for herself.

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