“Ned’s Declassified” stars address Drake Bell controversy after “Quiet on Set”: 'We f---ed up'

Devon Werkheiser, Lindsey Shaw, and Daniel Curtis Lee acknowledged their poorly-timed humor in a TikTok live video before discussing their opinions on "Quiet on Set."

Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide actors are addressing a controversy they inadvertently generated earlier this week.

Former Nickelodeon stars Devon Werkheiser, Lindsey Shaw, and Daniel Curtis Lee discussed Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV in a new episode of their podcast Ned's Declassified Podcast Survival Guide, and acknowledged their previous faux pas on TikTok that led to criticism from Drake Bell. “We were on a TikTok Live being asked to comment on the Quiet on Set documentary, which we hadn’t seen,” Werkheiser explained. “A super s--- joke came out that was referenced at Daniel and looked like I was talking about Drake, and it all overlaps. We f---ed up, I get it. We hadn’t seen the doc, and everyone was asking for our opinions on it.”

“There's a before watching this documentary, and there's an after," Werkheiser later said. "We were in the before while the audience was in the after, and that joke is f---ed up now.”

The Investigation Discovery docuseries, which premiered March 17, addressed claims of a toxic work environment and abuse at the network during the reign of hit producer Dan Schneider in the 1990s-2010s. It also featured fellow Nickelodeon child star Bell detailing the "extensive" sexual abuse he endured in his teens by network dialogue coach Brian Peck, who was later convicted of child molestation.

In the highly scrutinized TikTok, Werkheiser said, “Daniel, we told you never to speak about that. Get back in your hole, Daniel, and give me your holes,” joking to Lee offscreen. "Sorry, we shouldn’t joke about this. We really shouldn’t. Our set was not like that. No, it’s f---ing awful. The Drake Bell s---, that’s crazy to hear. That is f---ed. And that never came out, which is really wild. Really wild.”

Bell responded to their video on social media, writing “Ned’s Declassless…this is wild…laugh it up guys…laugh it up…’Give me your h*les?!!’ Really?!”

During Friday's podcast episode, Werkheiser said after watching Quiet on Set he understands the criticism he and his costars faced for the video. “I get it,” he said. “Now having seen the documentary, it’s so disturbing. ... Now we’ve watched it, and I get it. If I had just watched especially that third episode and then watched us joking like that, I would be like ‘Are they sociopaths? Is something wrong with them?’”

“You were talking to me while I was working,” Lee said. “I’m sitting there at the desk, working on audio, super multitasking, and that statement was directed to me in the extreme way that we disparage each other. My constituents were just completely upset, and they want it clear that we were not referring to that.”

“Even considering touching that topic or speaking on it at all now in the mindset we were in is so irresponsible,” Shaw added. "I hate that this happened. I hate that we compounded any trauma around this situation that means so much to each of us, and I am sorry.”

Werkheiser said that he’s never commented on Schneider, the primary subject of Quiet on Set, because they didn’t work together. “I never have because we didn’t work with him,” he explained. “We experienced it still in a safe enough environment. It wasn’t scary to talk to Scott [Fellows, Ned’s Declassified’s creator]. We had the normal pressure that a kid actor has, but knowing this is what our f---ing people were going through on other sets is f---ed.”

The Ned’s gang did, however, briefly work with Peck, Bell's abuser, as he was present for the filming of the show’s pilot episode. “I remember seeing however many months later my mom reading a newspaper and I saw his face and it said a child acting coach convicted of child molestation and I remember pointing it out to my mom going mom he was on the f---ing pilot,” Werkheiser recalled. “That's how close we were, but then we steered into this other experience.”

“We’ve been screwed over by the business in ways, but what was revealed in that docuseries — this is an urgent matter, like something needs to happen,” Lee added. “We’ve talked about the money woes associated with it, but it’s like, jeez, it’s even a luxury to have that to complain about when there are these really, really awful things that money cannot even bring back. It’s crushing.”

Later in the video, Werkheiser recalled fond memories with Bell and reiterated his shame about the TikTok incident “He came to our pilot wrap party, and I remember him kind of big-broing me in a cool way, like putting me under his shoulder, like ‘Welcome to the network’ and stuff. This was at that time [of the abuse]” he said. “I don't know how to process most of this."

"When I saw our little f---ing TikTok clip and that Drake had retweeted it, I was just watching his interview, and someone sent me that he had retweeted it. And then I saw the clip and I put out a f---ing apology immediately. I felt like a piece of s---," he explained. "I know it looks like I'm laughing at this and I f---ing wasn't, but I know what it looks like… I just felt so f---ing awful knowing Drake saw it in that context.”

Watch the full podcast video above.

If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual abuse, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor.

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Related content:

• Everything Nickelodeon stars are saying about Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV

• Drake Bell says 'I haven’t gotten an apology' from anyone who wrote letters of support for abuser

• Pedophiles on set, sexism in the writers' room: Everything said about Nickelodeon on Quiet on Set

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.