Jeanette McCurdy’s 2022 memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died, which chronicles the abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother and as a child star on shows like Nickelodeon’s iCarly, is being adapted into a 10-episode Apple+ series starring Jennifer Aniston.
And even though McCurdy hasn’t acted in years and declined to participate in the 2021 iCarly reboot, she will write and produce the series along with Ramy/The Carmichael Show producer Ari Katcher. Aniston will also serve as a producer.
I’m Glad My Mom Died is a harrowing read that traces McCurdy’s torturous relationship with her mother, which included highly invasive inspections of her body, an extreme low-calorie diet designed to keep her weight low, and a bathing ritual where her mother would shave her legs. There’s even an e-mail in the book where her mother calls her a “a SLUT,” “a FLOOZY” and “an UGLY MONSTER,” along with a request for money.
She never refers to iCarly and Sam & Cat Executive Producer Dan Schneider by name, but he’s unambiguously a character she calls only “The Creator” throughout the book. She describes “The Creator” having angry outbursts on set, massaging her shoulders, and encouraging her to drink alcohol while underage. “I want to say something, to tell him to stop,” she writes, “but I’m so scared of offending him.”
Her mother died when McCrudy was 21. “I genuinely felt I had no identity without my mom,” McCurdy told The Guardian in 2022. “I didn’t know who I was. I felt terrified, incompetent and incapable. Eventually, the process for me was realizing that those feelings were her conditioning. That was her voice, not mine, but it took a long time to get to a place where I could identify that I was, and am, glad that she died.”
McCrudy eventually had a difficult time finding a publisher for the book because of the provocative title. But Simon & Schuster took a chance on it, and the book debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. It remained on the list for well over a year and sold over 3 million copies.
In 2023, she told the New York Times that the success of the book changed her life in massive ways, since people in public no longer see her as a former child star. “Not one person has approached me for being an actor from the TV show they watched when they were little,” she said. “For the past year, it has 100 percent been being recognized as the author of this book, and I am beyond grateful for that. I wish I could describe to you how grateful I am. It literally makes my heart pound.”
Love Music?
Get your daily dose of everything happening in Australian/New Zealand music and globally.
From Rolling Stone US
