Ortega had starred alongside Barrera in the fifth and six Scream movies.
Jenna Ortega will reportedly not be reprising her role for Scream VII.
Multiple US outlets have stated that the actor has dropped out of the horror sequel due to scheduling conflicts with the second season of her hit Netflix series, Wednesday, which will film in Ireland.
The revelation comes the day after news broke that Melissa Barrera was fired from the movie over comments she made on social media about the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Deadline reports that Ortega’s departure from the film has nothing to do with Barrera being fired. However, according to Rolling Stone, there are rumours that Ortega had asked SpyGlass, the studio behind the Scream films, to end her contract due to Barrera’s firing.
The Wednesday star has also been vocal on social media about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Barrera and Ortega played sisters in Sam Carpenter and Tara Carpenter in the fifth and sixth Scream movies, which were released in 2022 and 2023 and were both critical and commercial successes.
Jenna Ortega exits Scream 7 after firing of Melissa Barrera over Palestine posts
Barrera played main character Sam in the two previous Scream films, but was fired from the franchise on Tuesday (21 November) over social media posts relating to the Israel-Palestine conflict.
In one of her posts, the Mexican actor said Gaza was “being treated like a concentration camp.”
Another read: “Western media only shows the [Israeli] side. Why do they do that, I will let you deduce for yourself.”
Spyglass deemed the posts to be antisemitic, and said in a statement: “Spyglass’ stance is unequivocally clear: We have 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.”
Responding to the news on X, Scream VII director Christopher Landon wrote: “This is my statement: Everything sucks. Stop yelling. This was not my decision to make.”
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