The 100‘s Ricky Whittle Claims He Was Bullied Off the Show, Slams Lexa’s Lackluster Death — EP Responds
The 100‘s latest castoff is not going quietly.
Speaking with AfterBuzz TV on Tuesday night, Ricky Whittle — whose fan-favorite character, Lincoln, was killed on March 31 — revealed that it was his choice to depart the CW drama, but only because he felt it was his only option.
“At the beginning of the season, [Lincoln] had a whole storyline that was cut, that was just non-existent,” he revealed, alleging that showrunner Jason Rothenberg “abused his position to make my job untenable. What he did was disgusting and he should be ashamed. … He was professionally bullying me, cutting out all the storyline I was supposed to be doing, cutting lines, cutting everything out, trying to make my character and myself as insignificant as possible.”
And Whittle, who is set to lead Starz’s upcoming American Gods, takes issue with more than just Lincoln’s storyline. He noted that Lexa was “too incredible a character to be caught by a stray bullet,” and that turning Pike into a villain has “taken away from his complexity.”
Despite his strong feelings about the show’s direction, as well as his own character’s mistreatment, Whittle encouraged fans not to give up on The 100:
“You still have to remember we have a bisexual lead [in Eliza Taylor’s Clarke], we have Bryan and Miller, we have various black characters who are in power, we have powerful women. Literally, the show has everything, so stay with it. Stay with my family. Stay with my friends.”
UPDATE: Rothenberg has released the following statement: “Ricky Whittle is a talented actor; I appreciate his work on The 100 and wish him all the best moving forward on American Gods.”
Watch Whittle’s full interview above — it’s over an hour long, but the “good” stuff starts around 19:45 — then drop a comment with your thoughts on Lincoln (and Whittle’s) departure.
Everyone is a cry baby now. Complain about everything. Waaahhhhhh….waaahhhhhhh
At least there was substance.
Ricky your character was my favourite, i thought his relationship to all groups made the story more interesting. After Lincoln’s death there is no grounder left i feel connected too and this makes the show boring. I thought your character was interesting and hope you find better opportunities else where
oh the irony in your complaint
His storyline could have been cut for many reasons.. maybe it wasnt working, they wanted to focus on other characters… his performance wasnt good enough… who knows.. but to claim it was all some personal vendetta by the EP just sounds like sour grapes to me.
Considering how rushed everything seems this season I can’t imagine squeezing in more story for Lincoln. If anything the show should have given us flashbacks of Farm Station the first few episodes to try and humanize that group a little more. As is they are a pretty terrible bunch of people.
I love Lincoln on this show! One of my favorite characters. Why couldn’t him and the big wig just drop the beef and do the show?
Frak. I knew Lincoln was dead as soon as Ricky signed on as a series regular. That’s usually a definitive sign that the character they’re currently playing is going to die. This new is quite sad because I like the 100 story, deaths and all.
Actually, the killing off Lincoln, as in episode written and filmed happened before he was cast in American gods.
Dude, be professional. Man.
No kidding! I wonder if he’s ever heard the phrase “you’ll never work in this town again” because he will now.
Suure, that’s why he was hired for Ameircan Gods… Gimme a break
Well both Bryan Fuller and Staz have enormous track records for not having their shows last beyond a few seasons, so he won’t have a job for too long.
American Gods is a *much* better gig than The 100. You’d have to have some pretty high-powered fan blinders on to believe otherwise.
@Simon. I never said it wasn’t. I pointed out that while he has a job, for which he was hired after he publicly bashed his former boss, his new bosses have bad track-records when it comes to keeping a series on the air.
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However, since you brought it up… The fact that American Gods has more money and a built-in fanbase makes no difference. Outlander has a 20+ year fan base, yet the ratings for season 1 were very weak. It’s clear one of the main reasons Starz didn’t cancel it yet is because they poured so much money into the project to just cancel it after one season.
That is not true, he is good looking and talented. I wish his character remained, it made the story line better. he was a major link to the grounders between the sky people. Plus too many deaths takes away from connecting to the characters. If every character you like and begin to understand dies, whats the point of watching more?
Such a shame, I really loved Lincoln and Lexa so the show has been a real disappointment this season. Won’t be tuning in anymore, though I hope any of the fans that do stick around are able to enjoy the rest of the season.
P.S. The article incorrectly says May 31st instead of March.
It’s a disappointment because it’s hard to believe the people of the ark as so stupid to follow Pike on a road to their own destruction. Some of the characters have done stuff for which I don’t think they can be redeemed. For example, with all the slaughtering Bellamy has done I’m hoping he gets killed off. His character is completely redeemable at this point.
At least he isn’t having his mommy fight his battles anymore.
His mother writing those tweets on his behalf were extremely inappropriate and unprofessional.
Because his mom isn’t allowed to have an opinion on her son’s treatment? Were you sitting over his shoulder as he told his mom what to write on his behalf? You people are something else…
Lol what???
His mother posted tweets about 6 weeks ago or so claiming that Jason was a bully and defending her son. Just Google, “Ricky Whittle Mother’s Tweets” and it’ll come up.
Wow that’s something. thanks
And they hired this guy to be Shadow?! Unbelievable.
Of course! He gives a damn about the show he’s working on. The dude’s got passion. If you have passion, odds are you’ll actually try when you need to do that acting thing that your job requires.
Sucks. I’m enjoying this season a lot. Nothing I hate more than people who watch only for their relationships and not the story.
I’ve really liked this season too. It’s sucks all the real life drama is taking over.
We only have this guys word that he had a big story line coming up. How do we know he isn’t just being sour grapes? You should never burn bridges because you might not get back across.
I am glad he’s come out and told the real story…someone needed to! I agree with everything he said above, I don’t have first hand knowledge of it specifically but I did notice from episode 1 this season that things had really changed from the basic premise and that Lincoln was left hanging out in the cold with little to no air time. Lexa deserved a better ending, Lincoln did too…and don’t get me started on Finn :( Best wishes to you Ricky, find a show that values your talent and awesomeness!!
Your right you don’t have first hand knowledge just the word of a disgruntled actor who was upset that his story wasn’t big enough. Anything other then that is pure conjecture.
Just like you don’t know everything he said might be true
Thank you! He was made a full fledged cast member early on, us viewers wanted more so TPTB promoted him…and then he was front and center and then abruptly his scenes and talking parts were very few and far between :( something happened and frankly it was clearly an upper-tier show runner who took the character a different way and wrote him into a corner. Sure most people think it’s the actor that causes trouble, but in this case it doesn’t seem that way. Just sayin’
I respect his honesty, too many fakes out there. yet he didn’t go nuts about it either which is the way to go.
“I wanted to leave in season 2” – No one made you sign a series regular contract. To complain about lack of screen time this season is ridiculous. Jasper, Jaha and Raven are utilised when needed this season. The problem with this actor is that it’s his ego that got in the way. If Jason wanted him gone, he’d have killed him earlier without hesitation. He’d done it with people before. It was only until he said, “I’m done, write me off” and so they did. Another T.R. Knight if you ask me.
Many people stay in jobs where they are not happy. A relatively new actor of colour is no exception. A pay check is a pay check. Stay there until something better comes along.
He’s only really “relatively new” in the US. He’s been pretty huge in the UK for well over a decade. Played a hugely popular character on one of the UK’s top drama series for a few years (Ryan Naysmith on Dream Team) and was a runner-up in Strictly Come Dancing, the show that DWTS is based off. I’ve been following his career since 2002.
Agree..if Jason is such an awful bully and hate this guy so much he would kill him already. Seems to me he is just sour his character didn’t do much this season and he didn’t get the storyline he wanted..lol
He might be sad he didn’t get more work but to accuse the showrunner of deliberating mess with his work because of god knows what, it’s just an awful thing to say..and with the mess with Lexa and the hate some fans have been spreading this just seems like another reason to try and blame everything that people don’t like on the showrunner. He even starts criticizing the death of another character and the way Pike character is going..i mean really? And then after saying all that he has the balls to say to people keep watching the show blah blah blah like he wasn’t criticizing everything a few minutes before
He just seems like he has a big ego and when he doesn’t have something the way he wants he turns the blame towards someone.
His character is not the only one who has few storylines this season and he never seems to think they took a turn with this character this season because it was planned from the beginning that he was going to die or because this was important move to make a new storyline to Octavia…
He seems he got the leading role he wanted.
The direction of this season has changed heavily, but if people are paying attention to detail they’d realise that it’s much bigger than just Sky Crew this season. Lexa was featured heavily and for good reason. The linking of origins of Space Station 13, Grounders and Sky people is prominent this season. All the cast have been in and out of episodes and it has been like that since the series began. There have been seasons where some characters are prominent in some seasons and not in others. Ricky had more screen time last season than some characters last season. Sometimes the writers scrap ideas last minute, it’s their job. I don’t see the actors who play Jasper, Raven, Jaha complaining. Hell, even Monty and here and there. The writers have good reasons for their decisions and I’d rather a character not appear for an episode or 2 if it’s valuable to the storyline.
He was a major link to the grounder and sky people. He should have stayed longer.
So he is sour they cut his storyline? Maybe they had decided he was going to die, didn’t like the way the story was going or they simply wanted to makes his dead a big impact towards Octavia and her development . When I hear he said he was bullied by Jason, the showrunner, I thought he was the one suffering and that for some reason Jason wanted him out of the show. This just seems like a guy who didn’t get what he wanted in this season in terms of work and his know complaining about it…lol
I feel for his character and the weak storyline he had this season..but to blame this on a personal attack for god knows what reason is stupid. I’m sure the writers and even the rest of the crew have more important things to worry about than to bully him into quitting the show.
I’d heard rumours about his disenchantment with Jason Rothenberg and his mother tweeted criticism of Rothenberg too. Still it is surprising an actor would burn his bridges and come out and criticise a producer so openly. Whittle is a Brit so maybe he thinks even if this other show doesn’t work out, he can always head back over here. Maybe he also thinks now is not a bad time to be critical as the show is under a lot of scrutiny after the PR nightmare of the Lexa death backlash.
Must admit, I was never the biggest Lincoln fan but this has been a weird season. Has he really had significantly less screen time than Raven, Abby, Kane, Murphy, Monty or Jasper? He was never the number 1 star. This season has probably had more screen time for Lexa than most of those others. Apart from Clarke, you could argue everyone else is a supporting character. With the new characters like Titus and Pike, and them squeezing all the Lexa time they could before she had to leave, most of the others have had abbreviated story lines.
wow, this season is terrible. every character remotely good dies and then we have bellamy and pike, who murdered 300 sleeping people. i’m not sure about pike, but i’m 100% bellamy will be redeemed and it’s not fair at all
Don’t forget the 300 Arkers that died because Bellamy stole the radio, and the 300 grounders that died because of the flares that only had to be sent up because Bellamy stole the radio.
It’s not fair? What’s not fair is how horribly written Bellamy’s character has been this season after all the progress he made.
They might write a redemption story for Bellamy, but it won’t be believable. There’s no redeeming what he’s done this season. He’s as much of a monster, if not more so than Pike.
Ricky’s character was literally the reason I continued to watch the show. I always wondered why his character was not shown more. I won’t be watching the show anymore. I’m sure that won’t effect the ratings much but there are so many tv shows and sites that offer so many choices that once I start watching another show I will forget this one. I did enjoy the concept of the show but people watch tv to feel good, all I would see is how stupid it was to kill off Ricky Whittle’s character. Good luck on your next adventure Whittle.
This has not been Rothnberg’s season. I imagine the past month has been hard with all the backlash surrounding the show.
Still mad about Lexa’s death, and now Lincoln’s but people need to move on.
…to another show.
hahahaha good one. FTWD on sundays… haha
I’m still watching though…
I don’t even watch The 100 and I have such a negative opinion of its showrunner. He sounds like a piece of work.
Cool.
Honestly i don’t really get the outrage. Show has always kinda sucked and being kinda sexist and suddenly when those feelings are more outwardly shown (Lexa’s death) people throw a hissy fit. Like where were you for all the previous episodes?! Did you guys really not see this coming?!
How is this show sexist? It is packed with strong, independent, capable female characters. Nearly all of the leaders in this show are women: Clarke, Lexa, Ice Queen and her protege, Abby, ect. And about Lexa dying, that wasn’t some attack on gay female characters, she was bound to die sooner or later, she kept pissing people off and betraying people in a very dangerous world, plus she had another show to get to. This guy sounds ungrateful, he should be happy with the lines he got, its a big cast, and when he finally did get killed off it was in the most heroic and noble way possible. He sounds like a cry baby.
Interesting that he waited till now to speak out, knowing the show has been under scrutiny the last few weeks. So throw it under the bus and trash the weak storylines but then say continue to watch? That’s not confusing. Sounds like a disgruntled worker that sees an opportunity to stick it to management.
Actually, he spoke about it weeks ago before the episode aired.
No his mother did. He hid behind her tweets.
THIS.
Weird how there’s no outrage about this, the death of a POC, and yet Lexa fans went crazy over her death. Hmmm.
Apples and oranges. I personally have no problem with Lexa’s death given everything it’s done to move the plot along, but I can see that killing off a queer character who is in a relationship with the show’s lead – another queer character – is a big deal already in that you’d be hard pressed to find many other sci fi shows (hell, many other shows – period) with queer characters as leads. Add in her fairly central role to the show’s major storylines at the point of her death and it’s a big loss.
On the flip side, Lincoln has always been a supporting character, his most meaningful connections have been with other second-tier supporting characters, and honestly this season his input has been minimal so his loss isn’t as acutely felt within the dynamics of the show.
Finn deserved nothing. Let’s all move on from Finn. Finn’s actor could not act and his character went dangerously insane.
At no point in the video does he offer any explanation for WHY he thought Jason was bullying him, and equates lack of storyline with being bullied. There are two sides to every story, and I’d love to hear Whittle admit what he said to Rothenburg in the past to get on his nasty side. Instead I’m seeing him equate cut storylines with ‘professional bullying.’ Meanwhile, he sits down for an interview and proceeds to slag the crap out of his former boss, which strikes me as professional bullying, too.
I get it. Rothenburg isnt a friendly boss. He might even be a terrible boss. But he keeps taking the high road while people try to drag him down and smear his name. At some point, people need to sit back and accept their own role in crappy workplace relationships, and this ill-advised interview won’t help Whittle’s career at all…
it’s fascinating how everyone’s telling ricky to shut up and not take it out on a few people, yet that’s exactly what all the lexa/clexa fans have been going for the past month.
nobody should go to work and feel like they’re not being taken seriously, that they’re just there for show instead of actually doing something, just because the boss says so.
it’s a daring move to spill all, but i don’t blame him.
people let the guy say his peace. He said he felt he had a horrible working environment, he didn’t like his bosses. he felt like he was bullied. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t want to show to be cancelled he said that the show is tremendous he just hates his bosses, for being bullies. At the end of the day don’t we all hate our bosses because I don’t like mine .