Apology not accepted. Hours after Lea Michele apologized “for any pain” she caused her former costars, Spring Awakening‘s Gerard Canonico fired back. The actor, who starred in the Broadway show alongside Michele, 33, in 2006, posted a comment on her Instagram apology.
“Seems to have been deleted. So I’ll try again. You were nothing but a nightmare to me and fellow understudy cast members,” Canonico, 30, commented on Michele’s post on Wednesday, June 3. “You made us feel like we didn’t belong there. I tried for years to be nice to you to no avail. Maybe actually apologize instead of placing the blame on how others ‘perceive’ you. You’ll probably just delete this though.”
The Emmy nominee came under fire on Monday, June 1, after her former Glee costar Samantha Marie Ware called out her tweet regarding the Black Lives Matter movement.
“LMAO REMEMBER WHEN YOU MADE MY FIRST TELEVISION GIG A LIVING HELL?!?! CAUSE ILL NEVER FORGET,” Ware, 28, tweeted in response to Michele’s message about justice for George Floyd. “I BELIEVE YOU TOLD EVERYONE THAT IF TOU [sic] HAD THE OPPORTUNITY YOU WOULD ‘S–T IN MY WIG!’ AMONGST OTHER TRAUMATIC MICROAGGRESSIONS THAT MADE ME QUESTION A CAREER IN HOLLYWOOD.”
On Wednesday morning, the “Cannonball” singer posted a lengthy apology via Instagram.
“One of the most important lessons of the last few weeks is that we need to take the time to listen and learn about other people’s perspectives and any role we have played or anything we can do to help address the injustices that they face,” Michele began. “When I tweeted the other day, it was meant to be a show of support for our friends and neighbors and communities of color during this really difficult time, but the responses I received to what I posted have made me also focus specifically on how my own behavior towards fellow cast members was perceived by them.”
She went on to claim that she doesn’t “remember ever making this specific statement” and stated that she has “never judged others by their background or color of their skin.”
“What matters is that I clearly acted in ways which hurt other people,” Michele wrote. “Whether it was my privileged position and perspective that caused me to be perceived as insensitive or inappropriate at times or whether it was just my immaturity and me just being unnecessarily difficult, I apologize for my behavior and for any pain which I have caused. We all can grow and change and I have definitely used these past several months to reflect on my own shortcomings. I am a couple of months from becoming a mother and I know I need to keep working to better myself and take responsibility for my actions, so that I can be a real role model for my child and so I can pass along my lessons and mistakes, so that they can learn from me. I listened to these criticisms and I am learning and while I am very sorry, I will be better in the future from this experience.”
Glee‘s Alex Newell, Amber Riley and Melissa Benoist, as well as Michele’s former Scream Queens costar Abigail Breslin, also liked the tweet shared by Ware.
