‘Boy Meets World’ stars Danielle Fishel, Rider Strong and Will Friedle recently talked about “the difficult subjects of grooming, childhood sexual abuse and their effects on victims” during their podcast Pod Meets World‘s February 19 episode.
The actors were joined by family therapist Kati Morton, and they opened up about their working experience and personal relationship with Brian Peck, who guest starred in two episodes of the sitcom’s fifth season.
This is actor Brian Peck. In 2004, he was convicted of sexually abusing a child and served 16 months in prison. Since then he’s had roles in over a dozen films and TV shows, including a few productions geared toward kids.
Umm… WTF why? 🤨 pic.twitter.com/NakIZjWvbw
— Rory O’Cleary 🏳️🌈🇺🇸💙🇮🇪🇺🇦 (@RoryOCleary) February 20, 2024
As per Variety, Peck “was convicted of sexually abusing an unknown Nickelodeon child actor” in 2004, which was four years after ‘Boy Meets World’ concluded. The actor “spent 16 months in prison after being charged with eight counts of sexual abuse.”
In the podcast, Friedle shared that he became close with Peck right after he joined the show. Meanwhile, Strong was also close to him, mentioning that they hung out “all the time” outside of work despite the fact that Peck was almost 20 years older than him.
The outlet noted that the young cast members didn’t care that the convicted actor is gay. With regards to that, Fishel expressed:
“The other adults on set, who maybe could have or should have said, ‘Why are you guys going to lunch with this guy?’ ‘Why is this guy going to Rider’s house for a party?’ There was probably a part of them that didn’t say it because they were afraid it was going to be taken as homophobia, instead of, ‘This is a boundary, gay or not. This is a boundary about adults and kids.’”
“And so I also think that’s important in the story of Rider and Will, about why he befriended the two of you so closely. And I did have lunch with him a couple of times, but only because someone else would invite me … He didn’t really make an effort to get to know me. He didn’t ingratiate himself as much into my life. I never heard from him again after the show ended,” she further shared.
Moreover, Strong and Friedle opened up about how the two of them ended up supporting Peck in court. In 2003, the accused actor was reportedly crying as he called Friedle, “instantly spinning it to where it wasn’t his fault, it was clearly the fault of his victim.”
At the time, Friedle wasn’t auditioning for roles due to his anxiety, and he had just finished working on a role for a movie, which Peck had gotten him. Neither of the actors knew how serious Peck’s case was.
According to Strong,
“He didn’t say that nothing had happened. So by the time we heard about this case and knew anything about it, it was always in the context of, ‘I did this thing, I am guilty. I am going to take whatever punishment the government determines, but I’m a victim of jailbait. There was this hot guy! I just did this thing and he’s underage.’ And we bought that storyline.”
“I never heard about the other things because, back then, you couldn’t Google to find out what people were being charged with. So in retrospect, he was making a plea deal and admitting one thing — which is all he admitted to us — but it looks like he was being charged with a series of crimes, which we did not know,” he added.
Thereafter, Peck asked Strong and Friedle to support him in court, which they agreed to.
“We’re sitting in that courtroom on the wrong side of everything … The victim’s mother turned and said, ‘Look at all the famous people you brought with you. And it doesn’t change what you did to my kid.’ I just sat there wanting to die. It was like, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ It was horrifying all the way around,” Friedle recalled.
In the end, Peck was “convicted of a lewd act against a child and oral copulation of a person under 16.” Friedle further explained that they “weren’t told the whole story, but it doesn’t change the fact that we did it,” referring to him and Strong supporting the convicted actor in court.
Friedle further expressed,
“There’s an actual victim here. And he turned us against the victim to where now we’re on his team. […] Getting taken in by somebody who’s a good actor and a manipulator, I could chalk that up to being young and that’s the way it is. It’s awful. I’m going to use that for my growth as a human being, but when there’s an actual victim involved and now I’m on the abuser’s side, that’s the thing I can’t get over and haven’t been able to get over.”
Meanwhile, Strong revealed how uncomfortable it was for him to open up about the topic for many reasons.
“I still feel like we should not be ruining this man’s life more. I still feel that. I think there’s a lot of layers to that. It just makes me so uncomfortable,” he admitted towards the end of their podcast’s episode.
You can listen to Fishel, Strong and Friedle’s full conversation on Pod Meets World.
Source: variety.com
