Former Charmed producer Krista Vernoff said in a recent interview that she quit after the show’s creative direction change
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Alyssa Milano and Holly Marie Combs are reacting to former Charmed producer Krista Vernoff's reasoning for quitting the show.
Vernoff – who is the current showrunner for Grey's Anatomy and Station 19 – said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that she worried Charmed was becoming "bad for the world" after she was allegedly pressured to write more revealing scenes.
"I signed on because Charmed was a girl-power show, and about halfway through there was an episode where Alyssa Milano comes out in mermaid pasties and there was a huge spike in male viewership, and then every episode after, the question would come from the network, 'How are we getting the girls naked this week?'" she told the outlet.
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Vernoff, 47, said that the pressure kept increasing as viewership went up. She told THR: "And they were throwing money at me, and the number keeps going up, and there's all this pressure, and all I can think is, 'I'm creating something that's now bad for the world, and I've had enough bad for the world in my life.' "
She left, and worked on Fox's Wonderfalls before landing the job at Grey's Anatomy.
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Milano, 48, defended Charmed on Twitter Thursday.
"Well, this absolutely broke my heart," she wrote of Vernoff's comments. "I hope we didn't make something that was 'bad for the world' for eight years."
Milano added, "I think we gave permission to a generation of women to be themselves and to be strong and own their sexuality. I'm so proud of what this show meant to so many."
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Combs, 47, responded to Milano and shared her sentiment.
"I can attest 1000% Charmed was not bad for the world. The reasons and people are too long to list. Maybe it was bad for Krista's world at the time. End story," the Pretty Little Liars star said in a tweet.
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"And the fact that we can still stand up for ourselves and the show and the people who loved it proves this," Combs added in another tweet.
"I never cared what producer or network exec wanted us more naked for their $. And still don't. We knew how to rally against it and found our own power. And still do. #Facts"