Scream 7 director Christopher Landon is breaking his silence on Melissa Barrera’s firing from the film. On Tuesday, reports surfaced that Barrera, who has become the face of the revitalized Scream franchise having appeared in 2022’s Scream and this year’s Scream VI as Sam Carpenter, had been dropped from the franchise following social media posts in the wake of the Israel-Hamas War. Now, Landon is responding to the news with a short statement that reads, in part “everything sucks.”
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“This is my statement: Everything sucks. Stop yelling. This was not my decision to make,” Landon wrote in a now-deleted post on social media along with a broken heart emoji.
Barrera has been vocal on social media when it comes to the Israel-Hamas War, comparing the conditions in Gaza to a concentration camp in one Instagram story.
“Gaza is currently being treated like a concentration camp,” Barrera wrote. “Cornering everyone together, with no where to go, no electricity no water … People have learnt nothing from our histories. And just like our histories, people are still silently watching it all happen. THIS IS GENOCIDE & ETHNIC CLEANSING.”
Spyglass, the studio behind the Scream films, has also released a statement about Barrera’s firing (via Discussing Film).
“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.”
Landon was announced to directing Scream 7 earlier this year with the Happy Death Day director taking over from Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, who directed both Scream (2022) and Scream VI.
“It came out of the blue for me,” Landon said of the Scream 7 job. “My understanding is that there were conversations happening for some time. But I think it was just an opportunity that really arose because the other directors who did the last two films, Tyler and Matt, they wanted to do something else. They were ready to kind of do something different. That’s when they obviously had to find someone new, and I’ve known Kevin Williamson, who wrote the original film, for a long, long time and he’s a friend. I think he threw my name into the hat and everybody kind of said, ‘Yeah, that makes sense. That seems to make sense.’ And I was just thrilled that I got that call because it felt very, it felt like kismet, it felt like a thing that like was always meant to be.”
As for how Scream 7 will address Barrera’s exit as Sam, that remains to be seen. The film is still in development, though Scream VI did see Sam’s sister, Tara — played by Wednesday star Jenna Ortega — play a major role which could present the franchise an opportunity to shift.
Scream V and Scream VI are streaming on Paramount+. Scream 7 is in development.
