‘Quiet on Set’: Dan Schneider Tried to Ask One Participant for Statement of Support Before Doc’s Release

Sunday’s new episode of Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV — now titled, Quiet on Set: Breaking the Silence — featured some fresh new perspectives from those who participated in the Investigation Discovery docuseries, including from former Nickelodeon‘s All That costars Giovonnie Samuels and Bryan Hearne.

In the episode, the two reminisced about how they felt about being the only two Black people on the set of the show — in front of or behind the cameras — other than their parents who joined them.

“It was very evident from the first day it was just the two of us. And I’ve said that before on social media, that’s the very first thing you do … as a Black person, person of color, you count who’s in the room in front and behind the camera. And there were two,” Samuels remembered.

The two were also presented with footage of disgraced producer Dan Schneider‘s post-Quiet on Set interview with former iCarly star BooG!e on YouTube, in which he responded to their comments about experiencing racism on the set of All That as children by saying he was pro-diversity, as evidenced by his casting choices.

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“Diversity has always been very important to me in my shows. If you go back to the very first Nickelodeon show I ever made, that’s very evident. As it is in the second one. And then the first movie I ever made for Nickelodeon, which starred Kenan [Thompson] and Kel [Mitchell]. And every show I did after that had a lead Black actor in it. I’m proud of that. It’s very important to me,” Schneider said in the interview. “And not only am I proud that they were in my shows, I’m exceptionally proud of the achievements they’ve had beyond my shows. They’ve gone on to bigger and better things, and that gave me a great sense of pride.”

Hearne was unmoved by Schneider’s statement, responding, “My gripe with the way that question was answered was that the question itself was posed to him about us. It was about us. He said, ‘Oh, I jumpstarted the careers of Kenan and Kel.’ So they talked about us being overlooked, and then he overlooked us in his answer. What do you do with that?”

The real bombshell of Samuels and Hearne’s segment, though, came when they were asked whether either had heard directly from Schneider recently, and Samuels answered in the affirmative.

“I got a phone call. He reached out a week before the documentary aired. He asked if I could give a quote of support,” she explained. “He knew I was in the documentary for a year, and he was like, ‘Oh, I love Gia, she’s great, she’s nice. Great, she could tell my side.’ … He asked, because I did come back to do Henry Danger, which was sometime later, he was like, ‘You had a good time on set, right? Right?’ I told him I was terrified of him. I said, ‘You have the power to make people stars, and I was intimidated by you. I wanted to do a good job.'”

Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, Streaming, Max