Last week, Marvel Studios and fired X-Men '97 Head Writer Beau DeMayo got into a war of words after the latter made some potentially very damaging claims about why his name has now been removed from season 2's credits.
The Disney-owned studio denied the change was a result of DeMayo's LGBTQ+ social media activity and chatter about sexual misconduct soon started doing the rounds online. Later, those were followed up by some shocking allegations about what exactly that alleged "misconduct" consisted of (DeMayo is said to have sent unsolicited photos and groped an assistant).
Jeff Sneider's source went so far as to say, "If you were a guy who looked like they could be under 30 on that show, you have his nudes whether you wanted them or not."
He's the only one to have elaborated on what Marvel Studios described as "egregious" behaviour and may soon find himself in hot water with DeMayo's lawyer, Bryan Freedman.
When The Streamr reached out to him with their own allegations - including a claim that multiple Marvel Studios employees reported DeMayo to HR - he hit back with the following statement addressing much of what the site planned to run in a story:
"You realize that Disney allowed Beau to have an Only Fans page while working for the company. No clue if someone quit while he was showrunner but that’s like every single day on every single show."
"My client never sent lewd videos and photos to his direct reports. That is a bald faced lie and defamatory."
"No one who reported Beau to HR received an inappropriate photo or video. That is simply untrue. As a proud gay black man, Disney knew exactly who he was and what he stood up for. That’s why they did not tell him to stop his only fans page. They let him be himself which allowed his creativity to thrive. When they objected to his free speech rights and not complying with illegal NDA’s a certain person over there tried to replace him because he was becoming more successful than other creators."
"Ask Disney if his separation agreement illegally silenced him. Let me know what they say."
"Don’t print this crap. It’s wrong and defamatory."
Should any of the allegations about DeMayo being published by sites like The Streamr and The InSneider be proven false or factually incorrect, they're going to be in big legal trouble.
With that in mind, now would be a good time to remind you that any allegations you see are only that; nothing has been proven and Marvel Studios has only made that one statement about "egregious" conduct; it was the trades that alluded to possible sexual misconduct.
As always, stay tuned for updates as we have them.