Lucasfilm says Gina Carano is no longer a part of The Mandalorian cast after many online called for her firing over a social media post that likened the experience of Jews during the Holocaust to the U.S. political climate.
What You Need To Know
- Lucasfilm says Gina Carano is no longer a part of The Mandalorian cast following outrage over social media posts
- Carano played the recurring character Cara Dune on the popular Disney+ Star Wars series
- Many online called for her firing over a social media post that likened the experience of Jews during the Holocaust to the U.S. political climate
- She deleted the post but it was widely shared online and spurred the #FireGinaCarano hashtag to trend
A spokesperson with the production company said in a statement on Wednesday that Carano is "not currently employed by Lucasfilm and there are no plans for her to be in the future."
“Her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable," the statement read.
Carano fell under heavy criticism after she posted that “Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors, even by children."
The actor continued to say, “Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?”
United Talent Agency has also dropped Carano as a client, according to Variety, as well as publicity firm ID PR.
The actor has drawn controversy for a number of social media posts since her high-profile casting in The Mandalorian, including blasting so-called "cowards and bullies" who called her out on her lack of support for the Black Lives Matter movement, mocking mask mandates to help stop the spread of COVID-19, mocking the use of gender pronouns by listing “beep/bop/boop" in her social media bio, and echoing former president Donald Trump's baseless claims of widespread voter fraud.
Carano, who played the recurring character Cara Dune on the Star Wars series, deleted the post but it was widely shared online and spurred the #FireGinaCarano hashtag to trend. Her character appeared in several episodes of the second season of The Mandalorian, a series about a bounty hunter and his quest to unite a powerful, young user of the Force with a Jedi Knight.
Dune, who in the second season is a lawperson on a frontier planet, frequently teams up with the title character to fight an old nemesis: remnants of the evil Galactic Empire.
Carano, a former mixed martial artist whose Dune character used a mix of heavy weapons and her fists to best opponents, had been criticized for social media posts that mocked mask wearing during the pandemic and voter fraud during the 2020 presidential election.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Lucasfilm scrapped plans to announce Carano as the star of her own Disney+ series following social media posts from November.
There are a number of planned spin-offs in development based onThe Mandalorian, including one titled Rangers of the New Republic that could have potentially starred Carano's character; Cara Dune eventually became a marshal for the New Republic in the second season of The Mandalorian.