A Snow White producer’s son is harshly slamming Rachel Zegler, accusing the star of hurting the film with her social media comments.
Jonah Platt, son of Marc Platt, took to Instagram to defend his father against Zegler fans in the wake of a Variety story that noted that Platt — apparently at Disney‘s behest — flew to New York City in August to ask the actress to remove a “free Palestine” comment that she made on X while she was thanking Disney fans for watching the Snow White trailer.
A commenter called Platt’s father “creepy as hell” and said the producer’s efforts to control Zegler’s social media post was “uncalled for.”
In a since deleted reply, Jonah Platt, who hosts the Being Jewish podcast, wrote: “You really want to do this? Yeah, my dad, the producer of enormous piece of Disney IP with hundreds of millions of dollars on the line, had to leave his family to fly across the country to reprimand his 20 year old employee for dragging her personal politics into the middle of promoting the movie for which she signed a multi-million dollar contract to get paid and do publicity for.”
He continued: “This is called adult responsibility and accountability. And her actions clearly hurt the film’s box office. Free speech does not mean you’re allowed to say whatever you want in your private employment without repercussions. Tens of thousands of people worked on that film and she hijacked the conversation for her own immature desires at the risk of all the colleagues and crew and blue collar workers who depend on that movie to be successful. Narcissism is not something to be coddled or encouraged.”
Disney had no immediate comment, nor did a representatives for Jonah or Marc Platt. Jonah Platt has been an advocate against antisemitism, and has repeatedly spoke out against Kanye West, such as after the rapper stenciled swastikas on his buildings.
Marc Platt previously weighed in on the topic of actors making political statements on his son’s podcast. Platt, who also produced the mega-hit Wicked, was asked about the film’s stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo making pro-Palestine statements and how he handles such instances.
“No decent human being wants any suffering in humanity from decent people,” he said. “What happens in instances is individuals ascribe their names to something, where they are not being completely informed, and the messaging to them is, ‘There is suffering here. We have to speak out for suffering.’ The message doesn’t include, ‘There is also suffering over here.’ Or, ‘There is suffering that was prompted, or instigated, by an act of terror, or an act of evil.’ Or, ‘There is a terrorist group in place that wishes for the annihilation of a whole group of people.’ That gets left out of the conversation. So my way of dealing with it is — when the moment is right — to have that conversation, where it can be heard and not in the midst of anger. And I feel good about those conversations that I’ve been having.”
Last weekend, Snow White opened below expectations to an estimated $43 million domestically. Globally, the live-action $270 million remake of the iconic 1937 film was expected to clear $100 million, but instead came in at $87.3 million.
There has been plenty of blame to go around for the film’s performance. There is remake fatigue, for starters — some question whether there was ever inherent mass interest in a Snow White revival. There are, yes, the film’s various controversies — from debate over the film’s handling of the Seven Dwarfs, to Evil Queen actress Gal Gadot’s pro-Israel stance. There is also the film itself — Snow White received largely negative reviews from critics, averaging a dismal 42 percent critics score on Rotten Tomatoes (it’s audience score is far higher — 74 percent).
Yet it’s also true that Zegler’s comments over the last three years have certainly made headlines and stirred up plenty of social media uproar. Zegler repeatedly criticized the original film and wrote a scathing post-election message about Donald Trump. Yet some corners of the fandom were also set against her from the beginning, given that a young actress of Colombian and Polish descent was cast as the traditionally white fairy tale character.
Zegler’s performance in the film, on the other hand, was widely praised — even by critics who didn’t like the movie overall. And in the weeks leading up to the film’s release, Zegler has gamely promoted the film and avoided any obvious stumbles.
