'Wicked' Star Marissa Bode Slams 'Very Gross' Comments About Disability

Wicked actor Marissa Bode has issued a public statement about negative comments surrounding her character Nessarose’s disability.

On TikTok, Bode shared a five-minute TikTok addressing the insensitive comments about her character Nessarose, who is the younger sister of the main character Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo).

Nessarose uses a wheelchair, and Bode is the first actress to portray her who also uses a wheelchair in real life.

“It is absolutely OK to not like a fictional character,” Bode said. “I am going to be admitting my bias in the way that I have a lot of different feelings on Nessa than a lot of you do, and that’s totally fine.”

“I think Nessa is complex, but that’s the beauty of art. Wicked and these characters and the movie wouldn’t be what it was if there weren’t different opinions on the characters and who’s truly wicked or not,” she continued. “And not liking Nessa herself is OK. Because she is fictional, that’s totally fine.”

Bode then shared that she's a “deeply unserious person” who doesn’t take offense to “silly, goofy, harmless” jokes about what her character does—but she made it clear that she doesn’t support the “aggressive” comments about her character’s disability.

“Disability is not fictional,” Bode added. “At the end of the day, me, Marissa, is the person that is still disabled and in a wheelchair. And so, it is simply a low-hanging fruit that too many of you are comfortable taking.”

Bode shared that before Wicked, she dealt with different jokes about her disability from people that didn’t share it.

“These comments aren’t original, and when these jokes are being made by non-disabled strangers with a punchline of not being able to walk, it very much feels like laughing at rather than laughing with,” she said.

Bode wrapped up her video by urging people to have empathy when thinking about writing disrespectful comments about others’ disabilities.

“Listen to the people or to the person that it is affecting and how it makes them feel,” she explained. “Thankfully, I’m at a place in my life today where I can recognize these jokes about disability are made out of ignorance. I couldn’t say the same about Marissa 10 years ago, and it would have affected younger me a lot more, and I’m worried that a younger version of myself is somewhere on the internet and is harmed by these comments.”

Wicked had an epic opening weekend late last month, hitting the top of the box office charts with $114 million in North America and $50.2 million internationally.