In the hours that followed Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis’ apology for writing letters in support of their former “That ’70s Show” costar Danny Masterson, Christina Ricci posted a series of Instagram Stories alluding to her own experiences with abusive people. She wrote in part, “People we know as ‘awesome guys’ can be predators and abusers. It’s tough to accept but we have to.”
On Thursday, Masterson was sentenced to 30 years-to-life in prison for two counts of rape. Kutcher and Kunis wrote letters to Judge Charlaine Olmedo as testaments to his character before subsequently issuing a video apology after the contents of those letters were made public.
Ricci began her posts, “So sometimes people we have loved and admired do horrible things. They might not do these things to us and we only know who they were to us but that doesn’t mean they didn’t do the horrible things and to discredit the abused is a horrible crime.
“People we know as ‘awesome guys’ can be predators and abusers. It’s tough to accept but we have to,” she continued, “If we say we support victims — women, children, men, boys — then we must be able to take this stance.”
Ricci added, “Unfortunately I’ve known lots of ‘awesome guys’ who were lovely to me who have proven to be abusers privately. I’ve also had personal experience with this. Believe victims. It’s not easy to come forward. It’s not easy to get a conviction.”
The actress then shared a photo of herself and her oldest child and captioned it “We out here believing and hoping for a better future.”
While she didn’t specify which people or situations her comments were alluding to, Ricci accused ex-husband James Heerdegen of abuse in 2021 after filing for divorce in 2020. She was granted an emergency protective order after filing.
Ricci told The Sunday Times in November 2022, “Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but it took me a long time to admit to myself what was going on, what it should be called. Denial is very strong.”
She added, “Of course, you don’t want to accept that the worst possible thing is happening and that you put yourself in that situation. So it took me a really long time to realize that.”
