Josh Peck is sharing his support for Drake Bell and all child stars who have opened up about experiencing abuse on set.
Earlier this week, Drake revealed that he was sexually assaulted by his Nickelodeon dialogue and acting coach Brian Peck, with whom he worked on All That and The Amanda Show in the late ’90s and early ’00s. The details of the abuse were extremely heartbreaking, and were revealed in the Investigation Discovery docuseries Quiet On Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, which also featured other young performers sharing their horror stories from the industry.
Related: Nick Creator Dan Schneider Denies Being Creepy With Child Stars
Considering the actors worked so closely on Drake & Josh just after this abuse occurred, everyone’s been looking to Josh to make some kind of public comment on the doc. And now, he is finally speaking out! On Thursday, the 37-year-old, who was also on The Amanda Show, wrote on Instagram:
“I finished the Quiet On Set documentary and took a few days to process it. I reached out to Drake privately, but want to give my support for the survivors who were brave enough to share their stories of emotional and physical abuse on Nickelodeon sets with the world. Children should be protected. Reliving this publicly is incredibly difficult, but I hope it can bring healing for the victims and their families as well as necessary change to our industry.”
Naturally, he turned off the comments after getting so much hate for not speaking up sooner. As we covered, the Found a Way crooner defended his former co-star via TikTok on Wednesday by asking critics to stop blasting Josh for not saying anything publicly. Bell confirmed that they had chatted in private, sharing:
“I just want you guys to know that he has reached out to me and it’s been very sensitive but he has reached out to talk with me and help me work through this. He’s been really, really great. Just wanted to let you guys know that and to take it a little easy on him.”
The men have had their differences in the past, but we’re glad to see them supporting each other at a time like this.
Thoughts? Let us know (below)…
If you have sincere cause to suspect child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org.
If you or someone you know has experienced sexual violence and would like to learn more about resources, consider checking out https://www.rainn.org/resources.
[Image via Investigation Discovery/The View/YouTube & Nikki Nelson/WENN]
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