Joss Whedon denies Ray Fisher’s new Justice League allegations

Ray Fisher (Cyborg) accuses Justice League producers of racism, and gets specific about what they did. Director Joss Whedon denies the new claim against him.

Back in July, Justice League star Ray Fisher (Cyborg) spoke out against Joss Whedon, who was called in to finish the movie after original director Zack Snyder had to leave due to a family emergency. Fisher called Whedon’s behavior “gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable,” and accused executives Geoff Johns and Jon Berg of enabling him.

Of those three, only Berg has responded to the accusations, denying them outright. Warner Bros. hired a third party investigator to look into the matter, but that proved messy, with the studio claiming on September 4 that Fisher wouldn’t cooperate with the investigation, and Fisher saying that the investigator was not as impartial as advertised. Fisher also accused DC Films president Walter Hamada of offering to  “throw Joss Whedon and Jon Berg under the bus” if Fisher lay off of Geoff Johns, a claim that Warner Bros. denied. Fisher has received explicit support from his Justice League costar Jason Momoa (Aquaman).

Now, in an extensive interview with Forbes, Fisher has gotten more specific about his accusations, and people from Whedon’s camp have made their first statement about the matter.

Let’s start with Fisher, who accused people who worked on Justice League of racial prejudice. “The erasure of people of color from the 2017 theatrical version of Justice League was neither an accident nor coincidence,” he said.

"What set my soul on fire and forced me to speak out about Joss Whedon this summer was my becoming informed that Joss had ordered that the complexion of an actor of color be changed in post-production because he didn’t like the color of their skin tone. Man, with everything 2020’s been, that was the tipping point for me."

Fisher also claimed that, after he leveled his first accusations against Whedon, he learned from “people in the room” that “blatantly racist conversations were had and entertained—on multiple occasions—by former and current top level executives at Warner Bros. Pictures. Decision-makers that participated in those racist conversations were Geoff Johns, Jon Berg, and current Warner Bros. Pictures Group chairman Toby Emmerich…I realized that the notes I ended up getting from Johns during reshoots were just a coded version of the racist things he was saying with behind closed doors with the other execs.”

“I plan [on] getting much more specific about each of these guys after the investigation is over,” Fisher continued. “This interview is just the abridged version.”

Now, Whedon has responded to the specific accusation leveled against him: that he changed the skin tone of a character to make it lighter, according to Entertainment Weekly, calling it “false.” Here’s the statement from his camp:

"The individual who offered this statement acknowledged that this was just something that he had heard from someone else and accepted as truth, when in fact simple research would prove that it was false. As is standard on almost all films, there were numerous people involved with mixing the final product, including the editor, special effects person, composer, etc. with the senior colorist responsible for the final version’s tone, colors, and mood. This process was further complicated on this project by the fact that [original director] Zack [Snyder] shot on film, while Joss shot on digital, which required the team, led by the same senior colorist who has worked on previous films for Zack, to reconcile the two."

Whedon’s camp also responded to Forbes pointing out that numerous characters of color had their roles reduced in the final version of Justice League, including Ryan Choi’s Zheng Kai and Kiersey Clemons’ Iris West. Whedon’s reps said that those decisions were made before he came on board the project.

SAN DIEGO, CA – JULY 22: Actor Ray Fisher attends the Warner Bros. Pictures “Justice League” Presentation during Comic-Con International 2017 at San Diego Convention Center on July 22, 2017 in San Diego, California. (Photo by Albert L. Ortega/Getty Images)

While racism was a big part of why Fisher decided to come forward about what happened on set, it wasn’t the only reason. “Race was just one of the issues with the reshoot process,” he said. “There were massive blowups, threats, coercion, taunting, unsafe work conditions, belittling, and gaslighting like you wouldn’t believe.”

Fisher also updated people as to the status of the Warner Bros. investigation. “My team and I have been informed that the third-party firm that was originally brought on to investigate Justice League has withdrawn from the case,” Fisher said.

"WarnerMedia has since informed me and my team that the old investigator purposely lied to us about the investigation. We’ve asked WarnerMedia to relay this information to the public and to retract Warner Bros.’ September 4th hit piece on me so we can clear the air and get the investigation back on track. They’ve refused to do so…so here we are…I’ve got a lot of witnesses that are willing to be interviewed, they’re just waiting on my go-ahead that it’s safe to do so."

Fisher intends to protect these witnesses “at any cost” and ensure that the investigation does not result in “people being allowed to dog-pile and scapegoat easy targets.” He’s aiming to have real change at the studio.. “My goal is to have these people not be decision makers for the content that influences our world,” he said. “These guys have been in Hollywood a long time. Their problematic behavior didn’t start with the AT&T merger, but I’ll be dammed if it doesn’t end with it.”

Ray Fisher is filming new scenes for Zack Snyder’s new cut of Justice League — the famous Snyder Cut — due out on HBO Max next year.

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