Quiet on Set - The Nightmare behind Nickelodeon and Teen shows (Warning: it will ruin child memories)

I have this fond of memory of mine when I was six or seven putting an alarm at 5 o'clock in the morning (don't know what was going on with me at the time) to sit on the rug in front of the TV with my brother and watch "Drake & Josh - Prima Visione". I was crazy for that show. Okay ICarly, okay Ned blablabla, Okay Zoey 101, but Drake and Josh was on another level. 

In the crosshairs of this article of mine today, there is a certain Dan Schneider. This man has been responsible for being abusive almost openly with the kids featuring in his shows (some of those were mentioned above) over the span of 20 years, from 1990s till 2010s.

In the early stages of his career Dan used to play the role of the chubby one in all of his tv appearences, and he was mainly regarded for this. After a while, he started to long for redemption, wanting to prove more of himself. He obtained a job in a teen show, and soon became the owner/writer of one. "All of that" was his very first show of success. Only two women were hired for the screenwriters team. They were first asked to share a salary between them, then for the second season of the show, one of them was fired (after being asked to perform in the role of a sodomised on the table of the writers' room with the excuse of that being a joke), and the second had to work low-paid and half of the weeks in the contract for free. It sounds like his respect for women was under his feet, doesn't it? Of course, although she would have lost her career, one of them, supported by her former colleague sued him. 

Soon enough (but late still) more and more teens, who were starring in the cast of All of that, The Amanda show, Victorious, Zoey 101, Sam and Cat, ICarly etc began to testify against him. The documentary I recently watched "Quiet on set" shows all of this. Drake Bell is also interviewed. Some other celebrities you might know about, victims of this monster and his crew (cause some other were accused along with him) are Ariana Grande, and Jennette McCurdy (Sam in ICarly). 

The Amanda Show was created soon after "All of that" and had as its main star a girl named Amanda. Her talent was noticed by Ben and she immediately became his favourite. In the show some formats are easy to misinterpret like the one where she (in a swimsuit) has to interview famous characters in a bathtub, with them being fully dressed. In one episode Ben is the guest star, and looking back at that scene, there is something so uncomfortable about it. There is way more examples of ideas that were unfair for kids to perform or even to watch. This Ben had a fixation with gelatines splashing on kid's faces, feets and cock's shape being applied on kid's costumes. What the actual fuck?! He justified himself saying that kids found that funny at the time and the audience also enjoyed it...

There would be many more things to say about this and about how much this human is wrong in the head. But you know what I find really sad? It's the repercussions this abusive environment had on kids. Some of them are still facing trouble because of that. And it was sad to find out that Drake Bell (famous singer, and one of the victims) was recently sentenced to two years probation for sexual intercourse with a minor, a girl he met online. 

This proves the mentally sick environment of TV shows in the 90s which is nothing like what it's shown on TV.

Another example of child abuse happened in the "Patito Feo" show ("Il mondo di Patty" for the italian friends). Juan Darthés (Leandro) was condamned for sexual abusing his co-star Thelma Fardin (Giusy) when she was only sixteen years old. The accusations were denied by that hijo de puta of Darthés (he is also married and a father). Everyone who was starring in the Patito Feo showed support for Thelma, first of all Griselda Siciliani (Carmen) who in the series plays Leandro's soon becoming wife. She also claimed that Darthés was subtly abusive in some of their intimate scenes. Darthés escaped Argentina and is now somewhere at large in Brasil where he cannot be persecuted. Coward. What is most touching of all this story is that he played a good dad and a respectable man in the series, and probably was regarded on set as a good, caring man, and a father figure for all the kids in the show.

Now, this is the cases we know about. Once I've heard someone saying " it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse one". I think it was in the "Spotlight " film about the notorious case of over 300 priests being child predators in Boston. Worth a watch. Coming back to the main topic, on set kids were never left alone, or not supposed to. How could no one notice?! It's hard when you are a kid to understand the implications of anything at all. You see adults on set laughing, you laugh as well. Sat on the rug, I laughed and laughed and laughed.