Melissa Barrera, after being fired from the Scream franchise for sharing support for Palestine in 2023, says it’s “beautiful” to see the support Macklemore has received after he was dropped from Ed Sheeran’s tour for his pro-Palestine speeches.
“It was so beautiful to see Finneas and the band and all the opening acts pulling out in support of Macklemore. It made me emotional, you know,” Barrera told the Associated Press. “I didn’t get that when it happened to me. I didn’t have any of that happen. It was too soon. People were too scared. But it’s good to see that almost three years later, at least things have changed.”
Macklemore drew backlash while opening for Sheeran and voicing his support for Palestine, and saying “Free Palestine” during the tour’s Sept. 4 and Sept. 5 shows at MetLife Stadium. Days later, he was dropped from the tour, with Sheeran saying that “Macklemore coming off tour was the promoter’s decision, it was not mine.”
In his statement, Sheeran also shared that he had spoke with Robert Kraft, owner of the Gillette Stadium, an upcoming stop on Sheeran’s Tour; Macklemore said in a statement the day before Sheeran released his own that Kraft “had rallied some of the other stadium owners and collectively they gave him an ultimatum: if Macklemore stays on the tour, you will not be allowed to play in our venues.”
Following Macklemore’s dismissal, Sheeran’s opening acts, including Finneas, Lukas Graham and Aaron Rowe, exited the tour in solidarity with the “Thrift Shop” singer.
The two-time Scream actress was fired from the film franchise after social posts she made amid the Israel-Hamas War. “Gaza is currently being treated like a concentration camp,” she wrote in one post on Instagram Stories in 2023. “Cornering everyone together, with no where to go, no electricity no water … People have learnt nothing from our histories. And just like our histories, people are still silently watching it all happen. THIS IS GENOCIDE & ETHNIC CLEANSING.”
A spokesperson for Spyglass said in a statement at the time that the company has “zero tolerance for antisemitism or the incitement of hate in any form, including false references to genocide, ethnic cleansing, Holocaust distortion or anything that flagrantly crosses the line into hate speech.”
“When someone is attacked, and there are people behind being like, ‘We’re not gonna allow this,’ and the more that happens, the less that the people in power are going to try to censor it, because eventually it’s not gonna work,” Barrera additionally told the AP. “I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if Ed Sheeran had been like, ‘No,’ and called the bluff. I mean, it’s possible that he still would have had his shows canceled, but I bet you that he could have rebooked those shows in other venues just as easily, and people would have rallied behind him.”
She continued, “I wish that the people that have power understood the power that they have. I think that the problem is that there’s a lot of people that actually have a lot of power; they think that they don’t, and they’re operating out of fear, and it’s just a shame because, you know, we just saw what happened — the support that rallied behind Macklemore — and I think that’s a big step. I think that what we’re seeing, what we’re witnessing, is going to inspire real change, and I’m very hopeful about that.”
Sheeran will play his first show since the controversy erupted Saturday night in Philadelphia.
