Disney’s live action “Snow White” only made $43 million in the first week of its domestic box office sales. It fell short of its predicted $50 million and extremely short compared to their other live-action princess remakes, especially with its budget of over $270 million.
Blame for the low sales quickly shifted towards the lead actress of the film, Rachel Zegler, who has been receiving backlash since it was announced that she would play Snow White.
Many fans disliked the casting choice, arguing she does not have “skin as white as snow.” Her interviews are known to facilitate a majority of the backlash she receives as people profusely disagree with her.
In a 2022 interview at the D23 Expo, Zegler called the original film “weird” due to the love story. She expressed that she viewed the prince in the 1937 version as a stalker and that in this more modernized version, a lot of things would be different.
Compilations of clips left people outraged, saying that this new approach means that the movie is spreading that a woman wanting love is “anti-feminist.”
“A lot of those clips are being compiled together to make it seem like I hate the source material,” Zegler wrote in a reply to a comment on social media. “I am the biggest Disney fan and a huge Disney princess girl. Our reality is that it’s a movie from 1937. No one has ever said that it is wrong to dream of love. No one has ever said that a woman must choose between her career and love — that is a lot of assumptions based off of small, short clips.”
The film was receiving hate for more than just Zegler’s comments because of the “magical creatures” as opposed to the seven dwarves, which stunted the original March 2024 release due to reshoots. The hate continued when, instead of finding actors with dwarfism to play live action versions, Disney opted for the use of CGI.
Variety published a hit piece bashing Zegler’s role in the movie, blaming the film’s poor box office performance on her outspoken political views.
It was revealed that the film’s producer, Marc Platt, flew out to see Zegler regarding a post she made on X, first thanking everyone for watching the movie’s trailer and then later posting “…and always remember, free Palestine.” She was told to take down the post, which she refused.
While the producer has not yet said anything regarding the sales, his son Jonah Platt came to his defense after someone commented on his podcast stating his father’s actions were creepy.
“Tens of thousands of people worked on that film, and she hijacked the conversation for her own immature desires at the risk of all the colleagues and crew and blue-collar workers who depend on that movie to be successful. Narcissism is not something to be coddled or encouraged,” Platt wrote in a since deleted comment.
Actress Melissa Barrera came to Zegler’s defense, pointing out that the same journalist who wrote hit pieces against her wrote the article against Zegler. As Zegler has received more backlash, more celebrities have shown support for her on social media including Pedro Pascal and Ethel Cain.
Vanity Fair claimed Disney is using Zegler as their scapegoat and over 160 journalists have come together to sign an open letter condemning the Variety article.
