'I'm Done': Ex-Nickelodeon Star Raquel Lee Bolleau Fed Up With Showbiz After Claiming Amanda Bynes Spat in Her Face Repeatedly on Set
Actress Raquel Lee Bolleau reached her breaking point with the media industry after a series of letdowns, the latest stemming from her appearance in the explosive docuseries Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, RadarOnline.com has learned.
Bolleau, now 37, was one of several former child stars who spoke out in the Investigation Discovery series about their traumatic experiences working at Nickelodeon.
ID aired a fifth bonus episode on Sunday, in which Bolleau revealed that during her time on the '90s kids' sketch comedy hit The Amanda Show, star Amanda Bynes was once told to spit liquid "directly in my face" repeatedly.
Bolleau explained that the bit was part of a sketch in which she would say "Spit it out," and Bynes, now 38, would spray "what was in her mouth, whether it was the water, or whatever," in her co-star's face. But after several takes, the actress said she'd had enough.
“Everybody thought it was so funny. Everybody’s laughing, but I did not find it funny," Bolleau said during her interview, as she recalled being the only Black actor in the scene. "The third time, I was infuriated."
"I was so mad that the director hurried and put me on the side of the set and was like, ‘Listen, Raquel. Breathe in. Breathe out. She’s the star of the show.'”
She claimed the director told her “Don't make too much of a problem. I’m going to ask her not to spit in your face. But you have to keep your cool."
The host of the Quiet on Set episode, Soledad O'Brien, presented the clip of Bolleau's interview to All That alum Brian Hearne and his mother, Tracey Brown, who were also interviewed for the series.
"That's racist," Brown said in reaction to Bolleau's story. "Period."
"Oh my god that hit me, really hard," Hearne added. "To just be told, 'You don't matter,' in that moment you're being spit on, and you're being told, 'This person matters more than you. Take it.'"
"We are culturally trained to take it," Brown said.
On Wednesday, just days after the episode aired, Bolleau posted a scathing TIkTok video, speaking out about her frustration with the producers of the ID show.
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The former child star, also a voice actress on Disney Channel's The Proud Family, said she was left out of "a huge discussion" earlier this week where "everybody I guess was going to come together to talk about the documentary."
"Do you think that they even thought about inviting me to this type of discussion?" she said in the emotional video.
"This is what has happened in my career over and over again," Bolleau continued. "This industry has done nothing but hurt me left and right, from since I was a child."
She also claimed that the producers "[didn't] even tell me what type of documentary that I'm gonna be a part of," and that they called her "the day the fifth episode was supposed to come out" to notify her she would appear in the bonus episode.
The actress revealed that participating in the series "has actually been a very very difficult thing for me to face," and that no one on the show "questioned whether or not this is gonna be triggering for me."
"Quiet On Set, they did the same thing that the industry does. They get what they want from you, and then they're done."
"I'm tired of the people in this industry," Bolleau continued. "I don't care for an audition. I don't care to be on nobody's set. I don't care for nobody to recognize me for the work that I've done."
"I can't do it anymore. I've given it all I can," she lamented, ending the video by saying she wanted to "get back to my family, my businesses."
Quiet On Set exposed child sex abuse and a toxic workplace culture at Nickelodeon. Drake Bell, who co-starred in Nick's Drake & Josh, revealed for the first time in the docuseries that he was sexually abused by a voice coach who worked on several kids' shows.