Pauley Perrette has officially left NCIS.
The actress confirmed many months ago that she planned to leave television’s highest-rated drama toward the end of Season 15, saying in October:
“There has been all kinds of false stories as to why (NO I DON’T HAVE A SKIN CARE LINE AND NO MY NETWORK AND SHOW ARE NOT MAD AT ME!)…
“I hope everyone will love and enjoy EVERYTHING ABBY not only for the rest of this season but for everything she has given all of us for 16 years.
“All the love, all the laughter, all the inspiration…I love her as much as you do.”
Perrette’s beloved character was written off last week, on NCIS Season 15 Episode 22, although writers chose to keep Abby alive.
This, in turn, left hope alive that Perrette may return to the series at some point down the line.
But we’re pretty sure Perrette has now shot down any possibility of a character reprisal — and she’s done so in cryptic/disturbing fashion.
On Saturday morning, while interacting with followers on social media, Perrette made it clear that she has been the victim of bullying.
She added that she’s been a victim of bullying at some place she had to be for years, implying strongly that these incidents took place on the set of NCIS.
Here, specifically, is the Tweet that has so many people talking and wondering:
I’ve been supporting ant-bullying programs forever. But now I KNOW because it was ME! If it’s school or work, that you’re required to go to?
It’s horrifying. I left. Multiple Physical Assaults. I REALLY get it now. Stay safe. Nothing is worth your safety. Tell someone.
Yikes, right?
This message came on the heels several other troubling messages posted by Perrette late last week.
For example:
I refused to go low, that’s why I’ve never told publicly what happened.
But there are tabloid articles out there that are telling total lies about me. If you believe them? Please leave me alone. You clearly don’t know me. (Sorry guys, had to be said).
We cannot say for certain what Perrette is alluding to here.
We follow both the celebrity gossip world and the television world pretty closely and we’ve never heard reports of this sort of behavior behind the scenes of NCIS.
That doesn’t mean it hasn’t been happening, of course.
Added the 49-year old star on Sunday as a follow-up to the previous two messages:
Maybe I’m wrong for not “spilling the beans” Telling the story, THE TRUTH. I feel I have to protect my crew, jobs and so many people. But at what cost? I.don’t know.
Just know, I’m trying to do the right thing, but maybe silence isn’t the right thing about crime. I’m… Just… ?
And then there was this Tweet, implying that forces out there (affiliated with CBS? With the show?) have been trying to keep her quiet for a long time:
There is a “machine’ keeping me silent, and feeding FALSE stories about me. A very rich, very powerful publicity “machine”. No morals, no obligation to truth, and I’m just left here, reading the lies, trying to protect my crew.
Trying to remain calm. He did it.
Back in October, around the time she announced her departure from NCIS, Perrette told USA Today that she had been “bullied by a powerful man for way too long in a work environment until I finally said enough and took no more words from anyone, including myself that being complacent was ‘good behavior.”
So this isn’t a brand new allegation.
But it’s still a very upsetting one.
If it’s valid, let’s hope the truth soon comes out and the perpetrator brought to justice.