Actress and comedian Jenny Slate will no longer provide the voice of Missy on the Netflix series Big Mouth, saying on Wednesday that as a white woman, she should not play a biracial character.
"At the start of the show, I reasoned with myself that it was permissible for me to play Missy because her mom is Jewish and white — as am I," she said in an Instagram post. "But Missy is also Black and Black characters on an animated show should be played by Black people." Slate added that by voicing Missy, she was "engaging in an act of erasure of Black people," and stepping away from the character is "one step in a lifelong process of uncovering the racism in my actions."
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