Shonda Blasts ‘Ignorant’ Deadline Story

Hollywood website Deadline incurred the wrath of Twitter last night after it published a story entitled “TV Pilots 2015: The Year of Ethnic Castings—About Time or Too Much of a Good Thing?” The article argues that white actors are being passed over for roles because casting directors are eager to cast to minorities instead, in order to capitalize on the success of recent shows like including Empire, Fresh Off the Boat, and Shonda Rhimes’s How to Get Away With Murder. The story sparked an instant backlash from critics calling it racist, and Rhimes herself weighed in on Twitter, calling the piece “ignorant”: “1^st Reaction:: HELL NO. Lemme take off my earrings, somebody hold my purse! 2^nd Reaction: Article is so ignorant I can’t even be bothered.”