The Scream Fandom’s Enduring Divide

In the early aftermath of Hamas’s brutal October 7th attacks on Israeli civilians, Hollywood celebrities expressed widespread support and sympathy for Israel. A-list actors like Jamie Lee Curtis and Natalie Portman shared sympathetic messages on Instagram with the #WeStandWithIsrael hashtag; some even posted images of a war-torn Gaza and mistakenly referred to them as images of a war-torn Israel—as Justin Bieber did, with few repercussions.

But in the weeks that followed, as the Israeli government responded with indiscriminate attacks on the people of Gaza, it was rare to see similar sympathy and support from Hollywood for the Palestinian people, even as the number of casualties climbed rapidly.

For Melissa Barrera, though, the injustice was too severe to stay silent. Barrera, the lead of the most recent installments in the Scream franchise—2022’s Scream and 2023’s Scream VI—began to draw attention to the death and displacement of so many Palestinian civilians on her Instagram page, through hundreds of stories (short posts that disappear after 24 hours) about the conflict.

Barrera had never been afraid to speak her mind on political topics, but now she was talking about perhaps the touchiest subject in geopolitics—with a whole new level of passion. On October 21st, she posted one particular story in which she wrote the following:

I have been actively looking for videos and information about the Palestinian side for the last 2 weeks or so, following accounts etc. Why? Because western media only shows the other side. Why they do that, I will let you deduce for yourself. Usually, the algorithm on social media gets the gist. Well... my discover page on IG will only show me videos showing and talking about the Israeli side. Censorship is very real.

One month later, the Scream franchise’s production company, Spyglass, announced that Barrera had been let go from the Scream 7 production—specifically as the result of her speaking out against the Israeli government’s actions. They never specified which post sealed the deal, but their comments suggest it was that one above.

“Spyglass’ stance is unequivocally clear,” they wrote. “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.”

Barrera’s firing was the first in a series of major changes for the next installment of the franchise. It was soon announced that fellow star Jenna Ortega had dropped out of Scream 7, and neither Jasmin Savoy Brown nor Mason Gooding were returning, either. Director Christopher Landon soon left the production, too, stating that, “It was a dream job that turned into a nightmare.”