Key Takeaways
- Lesley Vogel denied abusing Hayden Panettiere or forcing her into child acting, saying, “I was strong, definitely, but I was not abusive by any stretch of the imagination.”
- Panettiere offered a starkly different account, describing herself as “a little soldier” who received scripts and marching orders while “‘No’ was never an option.”
- Vogel’s denial follows renewed scrutiny after Panettiere’s death at 36; authorities found no contributing trauma but have not finalized the cause or manner of death.
Hayden Panettiere’s mother, Lesley Vogel, is denying that she abused her daughter or forced her into acting as a child, pushing back as her parenting faces escalating scrutiny following the actress’s death. “I was strong, definitely, but I was not abusive by any stretch of the imagination,” Vogel said to Us Weekly.
Vogel enrolled Panettiere with Wilhelmina Models when she was 8 months old, and the future Heroes star filmed her first commercial three months later. By age 5, Panettiere had landed a recurring role on One Life to Live, with Vogel serving as her first manager.
Vogel said she originally viewed the work as a way to build a college fund. “I never expected her to be a professional actor, never,” she said.
Panettiere remembered those years differently. While promoting her memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, she told The Hollywood Reporter that working was never presented as a choice.
“I was like a little soldier,” she said. “‘No’ was never an option.”
Panettiere recalled being handed scripts, ordered to memorize her dialogue and expected to follow directions. “I took my marching orders,” she said.
Vogel argued that her daughter created much of that pressure internally. “I know that she has mentioned, you know, [that she] ‘always had to please Mom,’” Vogel said. “I didn’t put that on her. I think she put that on herself.”
She also dismissed the possibility that Panettiere had been unwilling to work at such a young age. “Try making a 2- to 5-year-old child do something they don’t want to do,” Vogel said. “Are you going to be successful? No, you’re not.”
The denial comes after Ruby Rose shared private messages on Threads showing how deeply Panettiere said her relationship with Vogel still affected her at 36. “I was sobbing over her cruelty yesterday,” Panettiere wrote, adding that she felt “like a child who wants to find a safe corner to hide in.”
Vogel’s first statement following her daughter’s death also drew criticism from Gayle King, Megyn Kelly and Holly Robinson Peete after she said young entertainers sometimes “find the wrong path.”
Panettiere was found unresponsive inside a Greenville, South Carolina, residence on August 16. First responders attempted advanced cardiac life-support measures, but she was pronounced dead at 36.
