“Bridgerton” actress Ruby Barker is blaming Netflix and the Shondaland production company for failing to follow up after two “psychotic breaks” she said happened while filming the popular historical drama.
“Not a single person from Netflix, not a single person from Shondaland, since I have had two psychotic breaks from that show, have even contacted me or even emailed me to ask me if I’m okay or if I would benefit from any sort of aftercare or support. Nobody,” the 26-year-old British star said during an interview on Oxford University’s LOAF Podcast.
Barker portrayed Marina on “Bridgerton,” a Featherington cousin who gets pregnant and becomes a social outcast. The actress said her character’s unhappy situation negatively affected her mental health.
“During filming, I was deteriorating,” she said during the podcast interview. “It was a really tormenting place for me to be because my character was very alienated, very ostracized, on her own under these horrible circumstances.”
She continued, “When I went into hospital a week after shooting ‘Bridgerton’ Season 1, it was really covered up and kept on the down-low because the show was going to be coming out. … In the run-up to the show coming out, I was just coming out from hospital, my Instagram following was going up, I had all these engagements to do.”
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“My life was changing drastically overnight and yet there was still no support and there still hasn’t been any support all that time. So I was trying really, really hard to act like it was ok and that I could work and that it wasn’t a problem,” Barker said.
The actress had previously mentioned having a difficult time while filming the series, though, at the time, she had a favorable view of Netflix and Shondaland founder Shonda Rhimes.
“I just want to be honest with everybody, I have been struggling,” she said in a May 2022 Instagram video. “So, I’m in the hospital at the minute, I’m gonna get discharged soon and hopefully get to continue with my life and I’m gonna take a little bit of a break from myself.”
Barker described herself as “just rage-filled, frustrated, angry, you know, all this intergeneration trauma bundled up inside me, and I was carrying the weight of the world on my back.”
At the time, she specifically thanked Netflix, Rhimes, and Shondaland “for saving me … and giving me an opportunity.”