Constance Wu Reveals She Attempted Suicide After ‘Fresh Off the Boat’ Backlash
Constance Wu just made her return to social media after nearly three years, and she began by addressing her absence and the reason for it.
The posted a lengthy note on Twitter on Thursday, July 14, sharing that her hiatus stemmed from the backlash she received in 2019 for making negative comments about her former ABC comedy Fresh Off the Boat being renewed.
“So upset right now that I’m literally crying. Ugh. F**k,” the actress first posted cryptically at the time, followed by another vague tweet reading, “F**king hell.” The tweets have since been deleted.
Reaction from fans and her Hollywood peers was so intense, Wu says, that it caused her to attempt suicide.
“I haven’t been on social media in almost 3 years. Tbh, I’m a little scared, but I’m dipping my toe back in to say I’m here and while I was gone I wrote a book called Making a Scene,” Wu’s statement begins. “This next part is hard to talk about…but I was afraid of coming back on social media because I almost lost my life from it: 3 years ago, when I made careless tweets about the renewal of my TV show, it ignited outrage and internet shaming that got pretty severe.”
(Credit: Tyler Golden / ©ABC / courtesy Everett Collection)
The responses to Wu’s comments left her upset. “I felt awful about what l’d said, and when a few DMs from a fellow Asian actress told me l’d become a blight on the Asian American community, I started feeling like I didn’t even deserve to live anymore,” she writes. “Looking back, it’s surreal that a few DMs convinced me to end my own life, but that’s what happened. Luckily, a friend found me and rushed me to the ER.”
Looking back on her near-death experience, Wu notes, “It was a scary moment that made me reassess a lot in my life. For the next few years, I put my career aside to focus on my mental health. AsAms don’t talk about mental health enough. While we’re quick to celebrate representation wins, there’s a lot of avoidance around the more uncomfortable issues within our community.
— Constance Wu (@ConstanceWu) July 14, 2022
“Even my tweets became a subject so touchy that most of my AsAm colleagues decided that was the time to avoid me or ice me out,” she continues. “I’ll admit it hurt a lot, but it also made me realize how important it is to reach out and care for people who are going through a hard time.”
The experience led Wu to write her new book, Making a Scene, she says. “I’m here today to reach out and help people talk about the uncomfortable stuff in order to understand it, reckon with it, and open pathways to healing.”
Along with Fresh Off the Boat, Wu is best known on TV for her roles in the recently-released series The Terminal List alongside Chris Pratt and Prime Video‘s anthology series Solos. The actress made a splash with films like Crazy Rich Asians and Hustlers in the years since she broke out in Fresh Off the Boat, which ran from 2015 to 2020.
“After a little break from Hollywood and a lot of therapy I feel OK enough to venture back on here (at least for a little bit). And even though I’m scared, I’ve decided that I owe it to the me-of-3 years-ago to be brave and share my story so that it might help someone with theirs,” Wu concluded. See her full statement, above.
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), text “help” to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 or go to suicidepreventionlifeline.org.
