Dan Schneider has lost the appeal in the “Quiet on Set” documentary defamation lawsuit filed against Warner Bros. Discovery and Sony.
The legal team for Warner Bros. Discovery and “Quiet on Set” producer Sony was successful in directing the trial court to accept an anti-SLAPP motion filed against Schneider, which protects the organizations from suits that limit their free speech.
Schneider filed the defamation suit back in May 1, 2024, arguing that “through the use of voiceovers, photos, videos, graphics, editing and production,” the documentary “implies a false relationship between these subjects and leads a reasonable viewer to inaccurately conclude that Schneider “committed crimes of child sexual abuse,” per the suit.
“After seeing ‘Quiet on Set’ and its trailer, and the reactions to them, I sadly have no choice but to take legal action against the people behind it. In their successful attempt to mislead viewers and increase ratings, they went beyond reporting the truth and falsely implied that I was involved in or facilitated horrific crimes for which actual child predators have been prosecuted and convicted,” Schneider said in a statement obtained by TheWrap at the time.
Following the suit, the companies behind the documentary initially denied the anti-SLAPP motion, finding that Schneider had shown sufficient merit to proceed, but Thursday’s finding revealed he had not, in fact, demonstrated enough merit.
Launched on Investigation Discovery, “Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV” is a four-part series — which later added fifth installment “Breaking the Silence” — that “investigates the abuses experienced by children from the adults they expected to trust,” per the official description of the series.
The docuseries features accounts from former child stars who worked on Schneider’s Nickelodeon series during the ’90s and early 2000s, including Drake Bell, Leon Frierson, Katrina Johnson and Bryan Christopher Hearne.
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