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Big Mouth has cast Ayo Edebiri to voice Missy, replacing Jenny Slate.
The comedy writer and performer will first join the show in the penultimate episode of season four, taking over from Slate who voiced the character since the show’s inception.
On her kinship with the character, Edibiri told Variety, “I was definitely a very uncomfortable child, so I think the show speaks to that and a lot of those feelings, which still resonate with me as an adult.
“I’m back home in my childhood bedroom right now and on my bookshelf in between A Series Of Unfortunate Events is Bill Clinton’s autobiography and Nelson Mandela’s autobiography and a translation of The Iliad in Latin. I was a true dork. So I don’t think I have to go too far to connect with Missy.”
Slate, a white Jewish actress, apologised for voicing Missy, a biracial teenager with a white mother and a Black father, back in July and resigned.
“At the start of the show, I reasoned with myself that it was permissible for me to play Missy because her mom is Jewish and white — as am I,” Slate wrote on Instagram. “But Missy is also Black, and Black characters on an animated show should be played by Black people.”
Slate added: “I acknowledge how my original reasoning was flawed, that it existed as an example of white privilege and unjust allowances made within a system of societal white supremacy, and that in me playing Missy, I was engaging in an act of erasure of Black people.
“Ending my portrayal of Missy is one step in a life-long process of uncovering the racism in my actions.”
Big Mouth was renewed through to a sixth season by Netflix in July 2019. There is no release date set yet for season 4.
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