After Jenny Slate announced she was leaving Big Mouth, citing “Black characters should be played by Black people,” the show has announced the new voice of Missy.
Ayo Edebiri, a writer on the show, will now voice the character, as reported exclusively by Variety. The multihyphenate told the publication, “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.”
At first, Slate was going to voice the character for the entirety of the fourth season, but that plan changed. “By the time we made the decision to cast Ayo, we had finished all of Season 4 and delivered it to Netflix,” co-creator Andrew Goldberg told Variety. he shares. But, they found a moment where Edebiri could come in earlier.
“It’s about Missy’s continued evolution as a person — that she has all of these different parts of who she is. There’s the sidelines Missy and the more sexually adventurous Missy, mirror Missy, and then also this Missy that she’s been discovering [in Season 4] through hanging out with her cousins and really taking a look at her Black identity,” said co-creator Nick Kroll.
Edebiri added, “There are lessons to be learned [from the show] and it’s growing pains — like on the show. To me, it’s nothing but exciting. As a show and as a room and as a moment, it feels like it’s happening, and hopefully it’s here to stay.”
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