The Acolyte’s Jodie Turner-Smith: Disney Needs to Speak Up ‘When People Are Getting Dog-Piled on the Internet With Racism and Bulls–t’

One of the stars of the recently cancelled Star Wars series The Acolyte is speaking out against Disney for not doing enough to defend its actors against racist vitriol.

In a new interview with Glamour, Jodie Turner-Smith, who played Mother Aniseya on the Disney+ original, insists that the corporate giant needs to “stop doing this thing where they don’t say anything when people are getting f–king dog-piled on the internet with racism and bullshit,” adding: “It’s just not fair to not say anything. It’s really unfair.”

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“It would just be nice if the people that have all the money… were showing their support and putting their feet down,” Turner-Smith laments. “Say this is unacceptable…. Make a really big statement and just see if any money leaves. I bet you it won’t, because people of color, and especially Black people, make up a very large percentage of buying power. They might find that it’s actually more lucrative for them, but everyone’s using ‘woke’ like it’s a dirty word.” (TVLine has reached out to Disney for comment.)

Turner-Smith’s comments come after her co-star, series lead Amandla Stenberg, said that she faced a barrage of bigotry in response to her role as twin sisters Osha and Mae. On Aug. 28, following word that The Acolyte had been axed, Sternberg said on Instagram that there had been “a rampage of vitriol that we have faced since the show was even announced… a rampage of, I would say, hyper-conservative bigotry and vitriol, prejudice, hatred and hateful language towards us.”

Stenberg added that it had been “an incredible honor and dream for me to be in this universe,” and wanted to let the fans who did support the show know “that you were deeply loved and appreciated, and it made this job all the worthwhile for me.”

The Acolyte premiered in June on Disney+, with the eight-episode season wrapping up in July. Critics lauded the show for taking a fresh approach to the Star Wars universe, but a vocal contingent of fans rejected the series, with some labeling it as “woke” for casting a Black LGBTQ actor as the lead. On Rotten Tomatoes, the critics’ score for The Acolyte stands at 78%, but the users’ score is just 18%.

When Disney+ announced The Acolyte’s cancellation, Stenberg’s fellow co-star Lee Jung-jae (aka Jedi Master Sol) expressed hope “that maybe there could be changes in the future… I really hope we could get to see further stories [in a] second season.”

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