Amid controversy surrounding Disney’s live-action Snow White movie, comments have emerged from one of the producer’s sons, calling actor Rachel Zegler ‘narcissistic’, and blaming her for the film’s box office flop.
In a since-deleted Instagram comment on Wednesday, Disney producer Marc Platt’s 38-year-old son, Jonah Platt, described Zegler, 23, as “immature”, according to the Daily Mail.
Platt was responding to a critic who described his father as “creepy as hell”, following reports from a Variety article that Marc had flown to New York to speak to Zegler about her political social media posts.
Back in August 2024, Rachel Zegler posted the words “and always remember, free palestine”, in the same thread where she introduced the first official trailer of “Snow White”. Since then, she has been faced with online abuse and, reportedly, pressure from Disney execs to stop speaking up.
Most recently, Jonah’s online comments claimed that Zegler’s “actions clearly hurt the film’s box office”.
In a rant, responding to the critic, he wrote: “Yeah, my dad, the producer of [an] 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 …”
He also said Zegler “signed a multimillion-dollar contract” to star in and promote the film, adding that “this is called adult responsibility and accountability”.
When the critic commented to remind Jonah that Zegler was entitled to free speech, he accused Zegler’s social media posts of hurting the cast and crew.
“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,” he said.
“Narcissism is not something to be coddled or encouraged,” he added.
Opening weekend saw the film bring in $US87.3 million worldwide– a far lower figure than the estimated $US270 million it took to make.
Variety reported that when March Platt flew to meet Zegler, he asked her to work with a social media specialist, who would vet her future posts, which she agreed to do. However, Zegler, had earlier stood her ground to have her post supporting Palestine remain online.
Further controversy surrounded the situation as Zegler’s co-star Gal Gadot, who is Israeli, began receiving death threats, with Disney paying additional security for the mother of four.
There’s also been racist online abuse towards Zegler over the colour of her skin. Zegler is an American actress with Colombian heritage, and many comments have arisen over her casting as Snow White.
There’ve been a number of further setbacks faced by the Snow White film, including COVID-related delays, the Hollywood actors strike, a fire on set, controversy over the portrayal of the dwarves as well as public fatigue from live-action remakes, which have become increasingly common. In recent years, Disney films like Dumbo, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil bombing and Peter Pan & Wendy have also struggled to see success.