UPDATED 10/20/21, 2:47 p.m. ET: Warner Bros. TV has issued a statement in the wake of the allegations made by Ruby Rose.
“Despite the revisionist history that Ruby Rose is now sharing online aimed at the producers, the cast and crew, the network, and the Studio,” the statement reads. “The truth is that Warner Bros. Television had decided not to exercise its option to engage Ruby for season two of Batwoman based on multiple complaints about workplace behavior that were extensively reviewed and handled privately out of respect for all concerned.”
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Ruby Rose has opened up about her exit from CW’s Batwoman.
In a series of posts on their Instagram story, the actor detailed “what really happened on that set.”
In the posts, they described abhorrent working conditions as well as abusive oversight from CW’s higher-ups that forced them to leave the show for their own personal safety. “[Former Warner Bros. Television Group Chairman] Peter Roth, you are first up,” they began. “You are chapter one. not sure if you left after getting promoted to the highest position because you couldn’t stop making young women steam your pants, around your crotch while you were still wearing said pants or if you left after putting a private investigator on me who you fired as soon as the report didn’t fit your narrative. either way, when it comes to you, there’s already an army waiting for u.”
Rose explained that after they suffered a neck injury on set, Roth gave here a mere 10 days to return to work and said that “he wouldn’t recast” the part. That meant that they would be solely responsible for losing “the studio millions (by getting injured on his set)” and that “the whole crew and cast” would lose their jobs. Rose’s neck injury was so severe that they required surgery. Their doctors also found a tumor and a “broken rib split in two.”
Following their injury, Rose wasn’t able to travel to 2019’s Comic-Con in San Diego, and alleges that they were forced by Warner Bros. to share a video announcing that they would be unable to attend that year’s event. “Imagine having to take a pay cut to play a passion project and being so excited about Comic-Con and then being told they would not adjust the schedule so I could attend,” they wrote. “But then saying ‘we won’t announce it, you have to.”
According to Rose, they demanded to know “why must I be the face of this???” to which executives replied that they would remain silent on the matter and that they would allow fans to show up on the day of Comic-Con and be disappointed by her absence. Rose admitted they “folded,” and was told before posting their video that they needed to cover up the scar from their injury.
The accusations didn’t stop there. When Rose initially announced their departure from the show in 2020, they cited that the pandemic and production shutdown played a major role in their decision. However, on their Instagram stories they elaborated that the production team, and in particular showrunner Caroline Dries, was purposefully slow in responding to the pandemic, and deliberately delayed production shut down for as long as they could.
“[Caroline Dries] has no heart and wanted us to finish the season throughout the pandemic and I told her it was a bad idea,” Rose wrote. “I told her everyone was too distracted, constantly checking Covid updates checking on friends and seeing riverdale, the flash and super girl shut down already, i felt something bad would happen and [Dries] maybe visited the set 4 times in a year… UNHEARD OF..”
Rose also called out her former co-star Dougray Scott, who they said “hurt a female stunt double,” and “yelled like a little bitch at women, and was a nightmare.” Rose alleges that Scott “left when he wanted, and arrived when he wanted, and abused women.”
Rose concluded their scathing report by recounting some of the injuries crew sustained on set, including one that almost cost Rose their vision. “A crew member got 3rd degree burns over his whole body, and we were given no therapy after witnessing his skin fall off his face,” they wrote. “I was the only one who sent him flowers and cards and then were told we had to do a sex scene without a minute to process, we lost 2 stunt doubles, i got cut in the face so close to my eye in a stunt I could have been blind.”
Rose capped it all off by saying that they didn’t quit the show, and that they would never return. “So, in closing, please to my dear, dear fans, stop asking if I will return to that awful show,” Rose wrote. “I wouldn’t return for any amount of money nor if a gun were to my head...NOR DID I QUIT. I DO NOT QUIT, they ruined Kate Kane and they destroyed Batwoman, not me. I followed orders, and if I wanted to stay I was going to have to sign my rights away. Any threats, any bullying tactics or blackmail will not make me stand down.”
