Obi-Wan Kenobi star Ewan McGregor has responded to racist messages that his co-star, Moses Ingram (The Queen’s Gambit), said on her Instagram account she was receiving after the release of the limited series last week. McGregor responded in a video that was sent out on the official Star Wars Twitter account.
“I heard some of them this morning and it just broke my heart,” McGregor said in the video. “Moses is a brilliant actor, she’s a brilliant woman and she’s absolutely amazing in this series. I just want to say as the leading actor in the series, as the executive producer on the series, that we stand with Moses. We love Moses, and if you’re sending her bullying messages, you’re no Star Wars fan in my mind. There’s no place for racism in this world.”
Ingram, who plays Sith Inquisitor Reva Sevander in Obi-Wan Kenobi, posted many of the harmful messages on her Instagram story along with a statement of her own.
“There’s nothing anybody can do about this. There’s nothing anybody can do to stop this hate. I question my purpose in even being here in front of you saying that this is happening. I don’t really know,” Ingram said.
She continued, “The thing that bothers me is this feeling inside of myself, that no one has told me, but this feeling that I have to shut up and take it, that I have to grin and bear it. And I’m not built like that. So, I wanted to come on and say thank you to the people who show up for me in the comments and the places that I’m not going to put myself. And to the rest of y’all, y’all weird.”
The official Star Wars Twitter Account also posted a message of their own in response to the harmful messages sent to Ingram.
“We are proud to welcome Moses Ingram to the Star Wars family and excited for Reva’s story to unfold. If anyone intends to make her feel in any way unwelcome, we have only one thing to say: we resist. There are more than 20 million sentient species in the Star Wars galaxy, don’t choose to be a racist,” the statement read.