Yahoo Lifestyle Olivia Wilde Just Detailed The Terrifying Reaction To Her “House” Character Being In An Interracial Relationship, And Said That Extra Security Had To Be Hired
It’s fair to say that Olivia Wilde has established herself as both a movie actor and director in recent years, but it’s easy to forget that she actually got her big break on the small screen as a teen.
Olivia’s first breakout role was Alex Kelly in The O.C. back in 2004, when she was 19 years old. She then gained further prominence when she joined the cast of House for Season 4 back in 2007.
The star played Remy “Thirteen” Hadley in the medical drama, a bisexual thrill-seeker who is extremely secretive about her past.
In Season 5 of the show, Thirteen started dating Dr. Eric Foreman, played by Omar Epps. The characters’ relationship lasted into Season 6 of the show, and the dramatic ramifications of it extended well into Season 7.
And, per Variety, Olivia reflected on this early role when speaking at the Red Sea Film Festival earlier this week, where she shared the terrifying fan reaction to her character being in an interracial relationship.
Olivia said that the backlash was so severe that she had to have extra security due to “insane death threats constantly coming into the studios.”
Olivia previously reflected on this in a 2011 interview with Cosmopolitan, as reported by the New Zealand Herald, where she said that the 2009 episode where Thirteen and Eric shared their first kiss resulted in “a lot of hate mail.”
"There are racist people out there,” she added to the publication at the time. “We got hate mail that said that someone wanted to cut off my lips and kill me. We had extra security on set for a while."
Meanwhile, at the film festival, Olivia also reflected on the fact that Thirteen was considered “groundbreaking” back when House was on air as she compared her character to what is on TV nowadays.
She said: “Seeing what’s on television now, if you watch Euphoria, the fact that my character was shocking and groundbreaking then, it’s like, no, it’s nothing.”
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