Ariana DeBose has claimed she was not aware that a post she had reshared on her social media quoted criticism of her West Side Story costar Rachel Zegler.
DeBose had shared a now-deleted post to her Instagram on Monday which read: “Narcissism is not something to be coddled or encouraged.”
The line was quoted from Jonah Platt, son of Snow White producer Marc Platt, who blamed the film’s poor performance on lead actor Zegler’s “personal politics” and social media posts.
The new Disney live action remake of Snow White had a very slow start at the box office, making just $43m over its opening weekend on an estimated production cost of $270m.
The movie opened to generally poor reviews, with The Independent’s Clarisse Loughrey handing out a one star and arguing that “Zegler deserves better than the lazy, visually repellent Snow White”.
DeBose said on Tuesday that she was unaware of the quote’s origin and that she would start verifying the sources of quotes she put out on social media.
“I post quotes all the time and thought this one was meaningful. Will fully cop to the fact I did not do any research on where this quote came from nor did I know of the connection until it was pointed out to me,” DeBose wrote on Instagram.
“I have no intention of inserting myself into a news cycle. This is not the first time I’ve posted about dealing with narcissism and it probably won’t be the last, but next time I’ll be sure to clarify its origins first.”
It was reported last week that Marc Platt had flown to New York in 2023 to convince Zegler to delete a tweet sharing her support for Palestinian people.
In a now-deleted reply to an Instagram commenter who called Marc Platt “creepy as hell” for doing so, Jonah Platt blamed Snow White’s dismal showing at the box office on what he called Zegler’s “immature” social media posts.
He accused the lead actor of “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”.
“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 wrote.
“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.”
The Independent has reached out to representatives for Zegler and DeBose for comment.
Zegler made her film debut playing María in Steven Spielberg’s 2021 remake of West Side Story, with DeBose playing Anita, a role which won her an Oscar.
Snow White’s lengthy production process was beset by controversies, unrelated to Zegler’s social media posts. The movie initially drew the ire of rightwing commentators after Zegler’s casting was announced. They argued that the Latina should not play a character that is referred to as having “skin as white as snow”.
Zegler further provoked traditionalists by arguing the plot needed to be updated as, in the original film, Prince Charming “literally stalks her”.
“It’s no longer 1937,” Zegler said. “She’s not going to be saved by the prince and she’s not going to be dreaming about true love. She’s dreaming about becoming the leader she knows she can be.”
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