Josh Peck finally is offering his support to Drake Bell after the latter detailed the horrific grooming and sexual abuse he experienced while working for Nickelodeon on “Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV.”
After facing backlash for not publicly supporting his “Drake & Josh” co-star, Peck took to Instagram to explain that he waited to comment because he needed to “take a few days to process” the docuseries.
“I reached out to Drake privately, but want to give my support for the survivors who were brave enough to share their stories of emotional and physical abuse on Nickelodeon sets with the world,” he wrote atop a black screen.
“Children should be protected,” the father of one continued. “Reliving this publicly is incredibly difficult, but I hope it can bring healing for the victims and their families as well as necessary change to our industry.”
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The “Oppenheimer” star, who previously revealed that he and Bell were no longer friends, caught heat online for posting a TikTok in which he lip-synched an audio that said, “If I haven’t talked to you since 2023, take that as a f–king sign that you don’t exist to me anymore.”
While some fans believed the clip — which got over 12 million views — was directed at Bell, others questioned the timing of it.
In the disturbing docuseries, Bell detailed the “extensive” and “brutal” abuse he suffered at the hands of former dialogue coach Brian Peck — who has no relation to Josh — when he was 15.
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“Why don’t you think of the worst stuff that someone could do to somebody as a sexual assault,” he recalled. “I don’t know how else to put it.”
Bell recalled the first time that he was molested while staying at Brian’s Los Angeles home, which was closer to set than his home in Orange County.
“I was sleeping on the couch where I would usually sleep. I woke up to him — I opened my eyes, I woke up and he was sexually assaulting me,” the former child star, who met Brian while filming Season 2 of “The Amanda Show,” said.
“I froze and was in complete shock and had no idea what to do or how to react, and I have no idea how to get out of this situation.”
In 2003, Brian was accused of molesting an unidentified child, but, it wasn’t until now that Bell revealed himself to be the accuser.
The former dialect coach was convicted of a lewd act against a child and oral copulation of a person under 16. He spent 16 months in prison and had to register as a sex offender.
Despite that, he landed a job on the hit Disney Channel series, “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody,” after serving his time.
If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call the Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-330-0226.