Emma Thompson Pulls Out Of Film ‘Luck’ Because Production Company Hired Disgraced John Lasseter

Two-time Academy Award winning actress Emma Thompson made a bold statement on Tuesday when she pulled out of a film because its production company had hired John Lasseter, the former head of Disney’s Pixar who lost his job last year after allegations of sexual assault. Thompson, who was set to lend her voice to the upcoming animated film Luck, wrote a letter to the film’s production company Skydance Media removing herself from the film and berating the company for hiring Lasseter. Thompson also released a copy of the letter to the Los Angeles Times.

“It feels very odd to me that you and your company would consider hiring someone with Mr. Lasseter’s pattern of misconduct given the present climate in which people with the kind of power that you have can reasonably be expected to step up to the plate,” Thompson wrote in the letter. She then asked the company to explain itself in a series of five questions, wondering why Skydance should expect Lasseter to have changed or why they had chosen to give him a second chance in the first place.

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Skydance Media and Lasseter have yet to comment on Thompson’s exit from the film, but in a statement released on January 9, the production company defended its hiring of the disgraced animation expert. “We did not enter this decision lightly,” Skydance Media’s CEO, David Ellison, said. “John has acknowledged and apologized for his mistakes and, during the past year away from the workplace, has endeavored to address and reform them.”

Thompson and Lasseter have previously worked together on Disney/Pixar’s 2012 animated film Brave, which was released five years before The Hollywood Reporter first detailed reports of Lasseter’s history of sexual harassment. Since then, the 59-year-old British actress has been incredibly vocal about her support for the #MeToo and #TimesUp movement, and is eager to help change the problem of sexual harassment in Hollywood.

After her exit from Skydance was made public, a number of fellow celebrities took to Twitter to praise Thompson’s choice. Actor Anthony Rapp posted a screenshot of Thompson’s letter and thanked her for “speaking truth to power,” while Time’sUp’s Twitter page lauded the actress for “walking the walk.”