:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elfinanciero/DEOJPLSIWJCUZF4L4LGMNS5KKM.jpg "Matthew Underwood, ‘Zoey 101’ actor, says he was a victim of abuse at the age of 19 by his agent – El Financiero")
The golden era of Nickelodeon has shown that it was murkier than what was shown on screens. After the testimonies of Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, where Drake Bell talks about the sexual abuse he experienced from a company employee (Brian Peck), now Matthew Underwood tells his own story.
Matthew Underwood played Logan Reese in Zoey 101 (2005-2008), one of the successful Nickelodeon series that returned with a sequel called Zoey 102 (2023). Through Instagram, the actor said that he was also a victim of sexual abuse.
“I’m going to share with you something I never thought I’d have to talk about publicly, since it’s honestly none of your business.” The interpreter decided to share his own experience in response to the expectations of many fans regarding his position regarding Quiet on Set.
What happened to Matthew Underwood, actor from ‘Zoey 101’?
In his publication, the 33-year-old actor narrates that when he was 12 years old, the stepfather of one of his best friends abused him: “I lost the best friends I had ever had because I couldn’t spend time with them without feeling personal disgust.” and the betrayal caused by a man I trusted like a father to me.”
In addition to this, he had another terrible experience: “When I was 19, I was sexually harassed and then assaulted by my agent at the time, who had spent a lot of time gaining my trust as a friend and mentor. Once again, he betrayed my trust and shattered my self-image. I reported him to the agency and they have since fired him, although he is still active in the sector.”
As a result, Matthew left Los Angeles and ended his acting career. Approximately that happened in 2009, the model was also out of productions until 2017, when he returned to films like The Magic Studio and The Golden Stars.
Underwood thanked her current agents Lauren Green and Sam Hampton: “I want to thank Lauren Green for literally having my back since I was 8 years old. The only period of my life that I wasn’t represented by her was the year and a half I had this shitty experience with this other agent. “If it wasn’t for Lauren and Sam, I would never have been on a screen again.”
Likewise, he added that he has decided to tell what happened to him because he has received many emails wishing him and his mother to burn in hell and calling him a “defender of pedophiles” for not speaking publicly about Quiet on set.
“Those hateful words hardly affect me today, but I imagine many of my friends in the business are being similarly harassed if they don’t join the chorus, so I share this in the hope that some of you can recognize that just because one person “Don’t shout from the rooftops that pedophiles are bad. That doesn’t mean they don’t have their own reasons for staying silent, good reasons, personal reasons.”
Underwood added that she didn’t have a bad experience working on the Nickelodeon set or with Dan Schneider:
“Dan seems to recognize that he’s been a jerk in the past. I like to believe that he is fully capable of being a creator and a coworker that everyone can enjoy working with. I have no expectation of working with him again, I only wish well for anyone who wants to be better.”