Netflix says it has dropped a character from Uncoupled, a forthcoming sitcom starring Neil Patrick Harris.
The news comes after an actress who read the script for the Latina role complained about it. Ada Maris, who has appeared on numerous TV shows from the 1980s onwards, including a recurring part on FX’s Mayans M.C., called the depiction “hurtful and derogatory.”
Related: Neil Patrick Harris and Tuc Watkins to play gay couple who split up in new Netflix series
As previously reported by Queerty, Uncoupled will star Harris as a gay man who thought he had a near-perfect life … until he gets dumped by his long-term partner (Tuc Watkins) and finds himself having to navigate single life in New York in his mid-40s.
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The show is created and executive produced by Darren Star (Younger and Emily in Paris) and Modern Family executive producer Jeffrey Richman. It began filming last month. At the same time, Netflix also announced several other cast members, including Marcia Gay Harden.
Maris, who is Mexican American, was contacted by her agent for the role of Harris’s Latina housekeeper in September. She said when she read the script she was disappointed by how one-dimensional and stereotypical the character appeared.
“When I opened it and saw that it wasn’t even funny – it was hurtful and derogatory – I was shocked because I walked in expecting something very different given the way things are nowadays and the progress we’ve made,” Maris told Variety last week.
In the first episode, the housekeeper, Carmen, features in two scenes. She speaks in broken English and has to inform her employer, played by Harris, that he’s been robbed.
Hysterical, she tells him, “Mister, I just get here and they stole! They stole! They rob you! I don’t know how they get in.”
In a second scene, she picks up a glass her employer has just washed and says, “No, I do that. You don’t clean good, you always leave a ring.”
Maris says she told her agent she wasn’t interested in playing the role. But she was also surprised that it was in the script at all, given that those involved in the show’s creation are gay and might be more sensitive to the portrayal of minorities.
Harris, an executive producer on the series, was not involved in writing the episode or casting the role of Carmen.
Related: Neil Patrick Harris says it’s “sexy” to cast straight actors in gay roles
Maris decided to write a letter to Harris and Star, which she shared with Variety.
“You are modern gay men. How would you like to watch or play an outdated, offensively stereotypical gay part?” Maris wrote.
Netflix now says the character has been dropped from the show.
“We’re sorry that Ms. Maris had a negative experience, and this character will not appear in the series,” a spokesperson told Variety.
It is unknown if the decision to drop the character came about specifically following Maris’ letter of complaint.
Maris, 64, says she has no regrets about publicly speaking out.
“I’m just fed up,” she said. “If I’m not going to say anything now, when am I going to say something? I just want (writers) to think the next time they write a character like that. I’m speaking out for the younger actors coming up so they face even less of that than my generation has.”
WillParkinson
So instead of fixing your shit, you cut and run. Sure, why not?
bsg1967
Wow how hard could it be to fix this, what a joke will give this a miss
Kangol2
Wow. New York City is over 29% Latinx and this racist, throwback crap is what this show’s writers came up with? A stereotypical Latina maid character? It’s 2021, not 1981! Maris is right that things have changed in terms of representation and that the show’s gay writers should know and do better. Get with the times!
dinard38
Right. And instead of fixing the derogatory parts of the role, they just drop the character altogether. Shameful and disappointing!!
Raphael
“hurtful and derogatory”… Coming from Modern Family’s producer, it doesn’t surprise me.
Jim
Drop the character all together instead of rewriting it???? Now of course Ms. Maris, won’t get a job.
A sneaky way of punishing the whistleblower while appear sensitive.
NPH needs to make sure Ms. Maris get gainful employment.
Hank31
No he doesn’t.
moretruth
They don’t owe her a thing. If anything, she needs to apologize to all the maids out there
JoeyNE
It’s unfortune that writers of the show choose to present the Latina maid in this way. It also seems that alot of people making assumptions about NPH and the whole show. When we don’t know the enough about the show. My hope is that the writer’s/producers will learn this make show that is truly representative
Fahd
Too bad Netflix didn’t have someone who was not out-of-touch read Chapelle’s script ahead of time. Then they might have dropped that character too.
For me, Emily in Paris is not watchable. I hope this somehow turns into something good.
Hank31
#BeetJuice
Fahd
@Hank
Thanks for highlighting part of what was wrong about Chapelle’s “presentation”. My sympathies for the cancer or whatever it is making you such a corrosive personality, and I’m sorry about the inadequate medical care where you are. Take comfort in watching FoxNews – they’re against “all these changes” too.
Hank31
Whether I have a good personality or a bad personality, whether I watch Fox News or MSNBC, both or neither, whether the Universe is finite or infinite — Chappelle was still 100% correct in what he said about transvag.
Fahd
@Hank
#HopelessTroll
Hank31
It’s an outrage! Everyone knows that foreign-born maids speak perfect, unbroken English! I feel so sorry for that actress, who is so “marginalized” that all it too was one letter to get a Variety article and a script change from Netflix.
Mr. Stadnick
My you are filled with ire and seemingly towards everyone and everything.
cuteguy
@Hank666
You are as ignorant as ppl stereotyping gay guys as only being feminine. Is NPH going to be speaking with a lisp, while clutching his pearls and holding a Prada for this role? Most likely not. But in your messed up ignorant sick mind, that’s what should happen. Smh. Do us all a favor and go back up your mother
Donston
It’s not my place to say what is and isn’t offensive to whoever. And we don’t know enough about the show, script or role to make such determinations. But I will say that Darren Star again and again displays that he is a talentless hack stuck in the 90s.
DavidIntl
Yeah, stereotypes can be tricky. Just back from a road trip in the US. Literally every single maid I encountered in every hotel was a Latina speaking broken English. So, if you have a character in your script who works as a housekeeper, does it make sense to cast them as a middle-aged Danish guy?
moretruth
Exactly. And why is she getting a pass for shaming every hard working maid out there? It’s an honorable profession. Certainly more so than entitled bit actor.
justyouandi
My neighbor has a house keeper whose name is Carmen and she speaks in broken English. All it takes is one woke actress to make this specific kind of complaint and ….. stop the presses! The whole world has to stop! Film, TV, and the theater are going to get so bland they will become unwatchable. Indeed, in order to avoid offending anyone our whole lives are going to become bland.
I’m so tired of this faux outrage. Ada Maris is probably very proud of herself (and pleased with the publicity she’s getting) but I find her rather pathetic.
RosemarysBaby
I know exactly what you mean about being tired of faux outrage, because yours is absolutely yawn-inducing. Unless you are marginalized woman of color, your opinion on this matter is completely irrelevant, but please do feel free to bore everyone here with it.
Hank31
@RosemarysBaby I thought “marginalized” referred to people who were ignored and not listened to. This actress was the only person to complain about this character, and she wrote 1 letter. And that 1 letter from 1 person resulted in an article by Variety and an immediate response from Netflix. She is the opposite of “marginalized.”
Also, not all Latinas are “people of color” you ignoramus.
Saps48
I’d rather play a maid than be a maid…!
–Oscar winner H. McD.
Mr. Stadnick
Of course she said that in 1939
winemaker
Well well well, caught with his thong in a twist. Really why does the gay community idolize and support guys like neil patrick harris and gals like ellen degenerate who’ve proven their true selves and their hypocrisy? Really these yahoos seem to think that because they have a SHIT load of dough, have made it and are famous, they’re better than everyone else and can treat people like SHIT and it doesn’t matter. Time for these so called gay icons to go the way of the dinosaur. Just what talents do these two have that others do better? They have little to offer and what they have isn’t talent, they just got big breaks. One the other hand, if they weren’t ‘gay’ they wouldn’t be famous.
Donston
Both Neil and Ellen don’t appeal much to younger, progressive gays/queers/whatever. Their demo is mostly with 38+ year old white people and with corny “old school gays”. Also, it’s a reach to say NPH is only known because he’s “gay”. He had been on multiple shows and had gotten multiple Emmy nods before he was publicly “out”.
We really have to stop making everything a “gay issue” and move on from this “community” crap. Also, this is Darren Star’s show. He’s the one you really need to be calling out.
iminheatlikeacat
Did you not read the part of the article that says “Harris, an executive producer on the series, was not involved in writing the episode or casting the role of Carmen.”?
Actors that are executive producers typically finance the project in order to gain more control over their creative careers. Whilst this job title may, later on, be used to influence the direction a show is going (AKA Sarah Jessica Parker becoming an executive producer in the later seasons of Sex and the City, giving her more influence over the storylines – one of the main reasons that caused the dispute between her and Kim Cattrall) an actor as executive producer from the start doesn’t do that because they have no idea where the show is going, how it’s going to be received, or even what the show is really about at that point.
But don’t let little things like facts stop you in the tracks of your rant.
McSteve
According to the comments, since stereotypes exist they are not offensive. Ms. Maris complained that the character was one-dimensional, stereotypical and lacked depth…in other words lazily written. We obviously know (from the comments section) that catty, vacuous queens exist. But that depiction is one-dimensional, stereotypical and lacks depth. It’s okay to strive for more. And a ‘spokesman’ for the show responds with ‘We’re sorry Ms. Maris had a negative experience” !!?? That sounds like the Republicans’ response to January 6th.
Essie
Darren Star is not a good writer so I can understand why he would just drop the character rather than try to change it for the better. He doesn’t know how. I agree that just about every hotel maid I’ve ever encountered in the U.S. speaks with a broken accent but perhaps Mr. Star could have turn the “maid” into an “assistant” without any accent; or maybe a British maid or a Black maid (not fat or sassy). There are things that could have been done to remedy this situation but he chose to eliminate the character all together. Kind of gutless if you ask me.
bsg1967
“I agree that just about every hotel maid I’ve ever encountered in the U.S. speaks with a broken accent” WTF, you’re as bad as Darren Starr and co. Maybe the maids are pretending to have limited English so they can ignore your privliged self.
rayk1970
How about a show about gay men that aren’t privileged upper class? The problem isn’t the ethnicity of the maid but the existence of a maid.
Openminded
Excellent point.
moretruth
Do your own show
JustMuscles1
There is nothing wrong with having house help, it’s the portrayal that they are uneducated.
BoomerMyles
So I guess Google Gomez from Terrance McNally The Ritz would be cancelled in these contemporary times.
JustMuscles1
Times have changed for the better! If you take the time to see Rita Moreno’s documentary you wouldn’t have made that comment! Those were the only roles that she was offered until she refused!
humble charlie
And Rita Moreno wouldn’t career from career to career.
JustMuscles1
I’m glad that Ada Maris spoke out and stood up for rebuking the stereotypical characterization of Mexican/Americans. I have been screaming at the television for the past five years for the underrepresentation of Latinos in Television in Sitcoms, dramas, and News media outlets. There is plenty of African/American representation in commercials and as main characters in tv shows. It is well overdue to have equal representation of our Latino brothers and sisters in mainstream media. The time is now for people to support this change!
mecorrea1970
Believe it or not, there are still maids, house cleaners out there who still speak that way. yeah, it’s 2021 but even immigrants need jobs and some still speak broken English. people are just too Damn sensitive nowadays. Well, guess what it’s called life and things are not as perfect as you perceive them!!
Cam
Too sensitive “These Days”.
So you’d rather go back to the time when everybody except white guys were portrayed offensively and everybody just stayed quiet.
Cam
A one dimensional obnoxious portrayal of somebody? How shocking!
Oh wait, the guy from Modern Family is a producer? Never mind, then it’s expected.
Cam
I can just imagine the bitchyness that was in the room when she released her letter.
(The writer and producers)
“Ha Ha, that B*tch wants to play games? Fine! Let’s cut the role and not hire ANY Latino women over 30 for the show. That’ll teach her to keep her mouth shut.”