I had heard at the time, this is why he was written out of Discovery so quickly. Nutshell version: Six different women have made complaints against Obi, 51, who has been in a string of films, TV shows and plays. The shaven-headed actor, now based in Hollywood, was arrested at Heathrow after flying in from Los Angeles. Londoner Obi, real name Christopher Ogugua, has been questioned on suspicion of raping one woman and sexually assaulting a further five. He was released on bail pending further investigation. It is understood he denies any wrongdoing. The Met said the investigation relates to alleged incidents which took place between July 2012 and August last year. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/9611470/klingon-actor-sexual-assault-claim/
I did wonder why T'Kuvma never cropped up in the Mirror Universe. In Prime he was a "great unifier" and I expected him to be leading the Mirror Universe rebels, but instead it was Voq.
I had two people tell me during production that he was written out because of things like this. It required some reshoots. I dismissed it at the time because there’s always rumors when Trek is in production. However, I followed him on Twitter and he was working way longer than 2 episodes should have taken so maybe there was something to it. We will see.
Huh. Interesting. Put that into the pile as #375 as to why I'm almost more excited for a "behind the scenes" book of DIS' first season than for actually watching the 3rd one. Back then I actually thought killing T'Kuvma so soon was a nice twist - and interested in to where the story would be headed once they got rid of the big bad right in the beginning.
Definitely a show that had some behind the camera struggles in season one. They need to vet these folks better. Same with Harberts and Berg.
Vetting only works when there’s a real paper trail. Not just rumors. AFIK this is the first official charge. You can’t hire or not hire based on rumors.
Doesn't make it ok, just because it happens all the time. Presumption of innocence and all that jazz. Yeah, I know that's a legal term, but after seeing all the barriers people with felonies that are over 20 years old face in getting a job, it's kind of frustrating.
If I'm spending millions of dollars on a production, I'm going to do everything possible to not have it associated with actors who have rumors of rape surrounding them. Companies have the right to decide who they associate their brand with.
I don't know, I really can't fault the producers here at all. It seems like they wrote him out almost immediately after they learned about it. There's really not more they could have done. It's Hollywood, half the producers are con-man, and lots af artists are notoriously difficult people - you have to be kind of a control-freak to actually make a movie (IMO Fuller was probably too little a control freak for the budget and size of production he had), and lots of actors are people with either too much or too little self-esteem. It's easier to spot abusive behaviour if your work environment is crunching numbers or writing reports. But what to do about an actor that plays a psychopath being an asshole between takes? A director or producer wanting a properly "terrified" performance of an actress? That shit needs rules. But I can't blame anyone for accidentally hiring the wrong people - especially if they actually act on such complaints fast! But for DIS, I guess that really blew a big hole into their Klingon sub-arc. Maybe that's the reason why that felt so lifeless? (Though, to be fair, it already felt boring with T'Kuvma). But I'm now actually really interested in their original plans for the season 1 plot line(s).
Agreed. Let's not let hindsight bias cloud our opinion - it appears that once the producers knew, they acted appropriately.
Obi was underneath so much makeup they could have recast T'Kuvma for the third episode and no one would have noticed.
It's possible considering how long it took for people to find out the whole Voq/Tyler thing. But that would have caused speculation on why Obi was fired, and perhaps the legal investigations were not ready for that kind of public scrutiny yet? Anyway, I know innocent before proven guilty, but those are a lot of accusers. I hope they get justice.
It's extremely unlikely Obi or the producers knew about these particular legal proceedings prior to his arrest; of he was shuffled out of Discovery for similar reasons, that will be a different case no doubt. Perhaps one in Canadian jurisdiction.