The lawyer for a woman from New York who made a video that went viral of a Sesame Place character waving away her 6-year-old daughter and her Black niece says that other Black families have come to his office with similar complaints about bad treatment during visits.
A spokeswoman for attorney B’Ivory LaMarr also said Thursday that a new video of the July 17 incident at the Middletown theme park would be released on Friday. The video would show that park officials were wrong when they said the snub was a mistake.
The extra video was given to LaMarr by a witness who gave it to him after the original 9-second video of his client Jodi Brown went viral on social media this week after racist claims were made, a spokeswoman said.
LaMarr said at a press conference on Wednesday that he had a video that contradicted what Sesame Place said happened with the “Rosita” character.
Wiley also said that “multiple families” with similar bad experiences with character performers have reached out to the law office since Brown posted her original video on Twitter and Instagram. The video has been seen hundreds of thousands of times and received support on social media from former “Destiny’s Child” singer Kelly Rowland.
Wiley didn’t give any more details about the other complaints the office got.
Statements on social media have said that Sesame Place Philadelphia, which runs the Bucks County theme park, is racist. Sesame Place Philadelphia has strongly denied these claims.
When asked about the event on Thursday, a park spokeswoman had nothing to say.
In its third statement since the controversy started, released Thursday evening, Sesame Place again apologized to the Brown family for what happened at the park and called it “unacceptable.”
“It happened in our park with our team, and we take responsibility for that,” the statement said. “It is our job to make this situation better for the children and the family, and for all families.”
Since Sunday morning, park officials have been in touch with the family through LaMarr. They have also offered to meet with Brown and LaMarr in person as soon as Thursday to “personally apologize and acknowledge that we are holding ourselves accountable for what happened,” according to a statement.
“We want to hear what they have to say so we can learn how the experience affected their family and what we can do better for them and everyone who comes to our parks,” said the statement. “We are determined to learn as much as we can from this situation so that we can make changes that matter. We want every child who comes to our park to feel like they belong, are seen and are motivated.”
The statement also said that the park is taking action and reviewing its practices to “identify both immediate and long-term changes that need to be made.” This includes making bias training mandatory and getting in touch with “nationally recognized” experts in the field.
Sesame Place has gotten a lot of criticism on social media for what some people saw as a failure to take responsibility for the incident in its first public statement. In that statement, the park said that the performer’s costume made it hard to see guests at lower levels, which led to the girls being missed.
Was the Sesame Street snub planned or not? Sesame Place says that Rosita’s costume was to blame for the snub that Rosita’s mother calls racist in a viral video.
According to the statement, park officials also say that the “no” hand signal seen in Brown’s video was meant for someone in the crowd behind the girls who wanted the character to hold a child for a photo.
Children can’t be in the hands of performers.
Brown, who lives in Brooklyn, has asked that the worker who snubbed the girls be fired, and she has promised to fight for other Black children whose families say they have been treated the same way by park characters.
In Brown’s video, two girls with pink and blue backpacks are excitedly waiting for “Rosita” at a park parade. The smaller girl, who is Brown’s niece, can be seen reaching out for a hug. As the character comes up behind them in line, her daughter is shown putting out one hand.
The character is seen giving and getting high-fives from a white child and adult.
Then, a few steps before she gets to the two girls, “Rosita” looks into the crowd and shakes her finger in a “no” sign.
Then, it looks like she looks at the girls, shakes her head and hand in a non-gesture, and walks away from the camera.
Brown has said on TV that after turning down the girls, the “Rosita” character talked to a white family next to them, but that she didn’t get any footage of that.
Bucks County has more new places to eat.
Margarita flights and tacos are coming to Newtown. The Dog and Bull in Croydon is going to grow, and this rooftop bar has a great view.