Pablo Scarpellini Los Angeles
The Angels
Updated Wednesday, April 3, 2024-21:33
Brian Peck
had an impeccable reputation as an actor and speech teacher on
Nickelodeon
. Everyone loved him. Actors, producers, directors. There was nothing to suspect that
he would end up in jail for sexual abuse of a minor
. The mother of his victim, then 15-year-old actor
Drake Bell
, let him take him to the studio every day and let him sleep over at her house because it was more convenient. Or at least that was the excuse. One day,
Bell woke up on the couch at his house and had Peck on top of him, sexually abusing him.
The Californian actor had never spoken about such a traumatic situation. Now it has opened up for the first time in a documentary that chronicles the era of
abuse of actors of various ages, from minors to teenagers and adults on Nickelodeon
, the children's content network owned by Paramount Global.
Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV
revolves around that heavy work atmosphere prior to the
MeToo
movement and the figure of producer
Dan Schneider
, one of the architects of the network's success in the 90s and the following decade. The documentary, which consists of four installments, premiered a few days ago on
Investigation Discovery
and on the
HBO Max
platform .
The chapters cover
Schneider's policy of abuse
, including requests for massages from some of his colleagues and his particular taste for photos of the feet of the actresses he hired and which were later published on X, the social network. Protected by the immunity inherent to certain high-ranking officials in the industry, Schneider pulled the strings at will as one of the titans of Nickelodeon, responsible for successful shows for the network such as
Drake & Josh
,
Zoey 101
or
iCarly
, to name a few. the 15 he produced in his 25 years of relationship with the company.
The subsequent emergence of
MeToo
after the abuses of Harvey Weinstein and another long list of predators put a stop to
Schneider
. In June 2021 it was confirmed that the network's decision to fire the producer was linked to an investigation that detailed the abusive attitude of the person responsible for
Henry Danger
. A subsequent report by
Insider
magazine
corroborated the climate of abuse and discrimination prevailing on the channel.
Schneider does not appear in the HBO Max documentary but he did react to its premiere on March 17. He published a video on his YouTube channel where
he acknowledges that watching the documentary was "very difficult" when he had to face his behavior in the past
, with actions that he describes as "shameful and that I regret. I definitely owe him a very forceful apology." to some people".
Nickelodeon, for its part, assured that it has investigated "all formal complaints as part of our commitment to promoting a safe and professional workplace," assuming that situations like this will not happen again.
But for years it was a common currency. Even after Peck's arrest, support for his figure was massive, with messages of solidarity from actors like
Alan Ticke
and
Taran William
, or directors like
Beth
and
Rich Correll
. After the conviction and the details of the case became known, they backed down.
Joanna Kerns
, known for her role in
The Troubles Grow
, confesses in the documentary that "if I had known what I know now" she would never have written a letter of support to Peck.
It was Bell's father, Joe, who first realized there was a strange interest from the 41-year-old diction expert in his teenage son. When he reported the situation to the
Nickelodeon
offices , they were inclined to think that it was a homophobic attitude towards Peck, who was openly homosexual.
The teenager remained silent until he couldn't take it anymore and confessed it to his mother
. She called the police immediately and the officers managed to get Peck to confess. They overheard a conversation between the young actor and his attacker.
Although Peck was sentenced to 16 months in prison and included on the list of sexual predators, the Californian interpreter of
The Amanda Show
regrets in the documentary that his attacker is now free and has returned to his old ways. He explains that
he found him in a restaurant surrounded by young actors between 14 and 16 years old
. "I saw that he had gone back to what he was doing and I turned around and left," he explains.
The mother of one of the actresses in the series
All That
says that Jason Handy, one of the production assistants, asked the actress, Brandi, for her email address to eventually
send her a photo of himself naked and masturbating
. Furthermore, two of the scriptwriters of that same series affirm in the documentary that
there were flagrant cases of sexual abuse and situations of discrimination
, all of which Schneider allowed. They were paid half as much as other men in the same position.
Allie DiMeco
, the 31-year-old former actress, shares that she was forced to kiss a man "in his 30s" so as not to lose her role in
The Naked Brothers Band
. He was 14 years old then.
Massage scenes were also common in the different filming studios. Schneider promised one of the editors a promotion that later went to a colleague who had not had to lay a finger on her.
A dark period on Nickelodeon
that is now coming to light again even more explicitly.