Ryan Reynolds says he and Blake Lively are deeply sorry for having their wedding at a former plantation, and even went so far as to call the decision "a giant fucking mistake."
The Deadpool actor addressed the controversy during a recent interview with Fast Company. Reynolds and Lively tied the knot in September 2012 and held a ceremony at Boone Hall in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. The couple came under fire for the venue choice in 2018, after Reynolds tweeted his support for Marvel's Black Panther, which was hailed a celebration of Black culture.
"It’s something we’ll always be deeply and unreservedly sorry for," Reynolds said about the Boone Hall ceremony. "It’s impossible to reconcile. What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. What we saw after was a place built upon devastating tragedy."
He continued: "Years ago we got married again at home—but shame works in weird ways. A giant fucking mistake like that can either cause you to shut down or it can reframe things and move you into action. It doesn’t mean you won’t fuck up again. But repatterning and challenging lifelong social conditioning is a job that doesn’t end."
Though Reynolds says the mistake cannot be reconciled, he and his wife have been committed to the fight for racial justice. The couple reportedly donated $2 million to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the Young Center for Immigrant Children's Rights last year. Reynolds also launched The Group Effort Initiative, a diversity program that aims to bring more people of color into the film industry.
