Fox News Flash top entertainment headlines for February 16
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Actress Gina Carano says she found out she was recently fired from the Disney+ series "The Mandalorian" via social media.
The 38-year-old entertainer played Cara Dune on the "Star Wars" series produced by Lucasfilm, which is owned by Disney.
Carano told former New York Times opinion columnist and editor, Bari Weiss, in her Common Sense newsletter that she and Lucasfilm had been at odds for a while regarding what Carano posts on social media. Most recently, Carano drew criticism after she posted a message on Instagram in which she compared today's political divide to the events in Nazi Germany.
"I found out through social media, like everyone else, that I had been fired," she revealed.
Carano claims the friction began with Lucasfilm in November when she changed her Twitter profile and added "beep/bop/boop" as her pronouns, which some people interpreted as a mocking of the transgender community.
The former MMA fighter alleged that Lucasfilm wanted her to post an apology written by their team.
Actor Gina Carano alleges she was excluded from doing press for Season 2 of 'The Mandalorian.' (Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for Disney)
"Earlier on last year before 'The Mandalorian' came out, they wanted me to use their exact wording for an apology over pronoun usage. I declined and offered a statement in my own words. I made clear I wanted nothing to do with mocking the transgender community, and was just drawing attention to the abuse of the mob in forcing people to put pronouns in their bio," she explained.
GINA CARANO'S 'MANDALORIAN' CHARACTER TOYS SCRAPPED BY HASBRO AMID CONTROVERSY
Per Carano, Lucasfilm then allegedly sidelined her during press for Season 2 of "The Mandalorian."
"That was heart-breaking, but I didn't want to take away from the hard work of everyone who worked on the project, so I said ok. That was the last time I was contacted about any type of public statement or apology from Lucasfilm," she said.
On Feb. 10, a Lucasfilm spokesperson said in a statement obtained by Variety, "Gina Carano is not currently employed by Lucasfilm and there are no plans for her to be in the future. Nevertheless, her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable."
Gina Carano was also dropped by her talent agency UTA. (Rodin Eckenroth/FilmMagic)
In the aftermath of her firing, Carano was also dropped by her talent agency UTA and Hasbro has reportedly scrapped plans to make more toys based on her sci-fi character.
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In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, retailer BigBadToyStore noted that the company is not producing any more action figures of Carano’s character in light of recent events, forcing it to cancel pre-orders.
"The Star Wars Black Cara Dune figure was released in 2020 and sold out not long after the inventory was received," a spokeswoman for BigBadToyStore told the outlet Monday via email. "Hasbro planned for another production run and we were accepting preorders from that production run. Due to recent events, Hasbro was no longer approved to produce any more of this figure."
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Carano’s firing from Disney prompted many fans of both her and "The Mandalorian" to sign a Change.org petition calling on Disney to reverse its decision to fire the actress.
Despite calls to reinstate her, Carano has already moved on from "The Mandalorian." According to Deadline, the actress is hitting back at Disney and cancel culture by partnering with Ben Shapiro’s The Daily Wire on a new movie project.
Lucasfilm did not immediately respond to Fox News' request for comment.
Fox News' Tyler McCarthy contributed to this report.
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