The Real Reason This Rising Star Quit NCIS: New Orleans
Shalita Grant's career seems to be going so well with her role in Netflix's "You" that it's easy to forget she previously starred in "NCIS: New Orleans," the regional spin-off of CBS' wildly popular procedural drama. According to IMDb, Grant was on the show playing Sonja Percy from 2015 until 2018. (CBS News reports the show was canceled earlier this year.) Departures from long-running procedurals like "NCIS" are common. Actors who portrayed popular characters, like Pauley Perrette and Cote de Pablo, left the main series amid their own dissatisfaction. In fact, star and executive producer Mark Harmon — the face of the entire franchise — recently left the show after more than 18 seasons.
While Grant has moved on to bigger and better things, her experience on "NCIS: New Orleans" appears to have left a sour taste in her mouth. Now, she is opening up about her reason for leaving and the mistreatment she suffered during her time on the show.
Shalita Grant felt mistreated by the hair department
In an interview with Tamron Hall, Shalita Grant revealed the real reason she left "NCIS: New Orleans," a decision she said was "about a year-and-a-half in the making" — and it all had to do with her hair. Grant said her treatment from the hair department was "totally different" than her white co-workers, saying she had to buy her own wigs and come in with her hair already done despite the show being "a multi-million dollar production." Grant also documented the physical damage the hair department inflicted on her natural hair. "I had already had a bald spot in my head from Season 2," she said. "In the front of my head, I was threatening baldness."
Grant also noted an experience where she was blamed for not wanting to walk in the rain out of fear of messing up her hair, even though her white co-workers also felt the same way. After this, word began to spread around Hollywood that she was "difficult" to work with. "And for a Black woman in the business, you know that is a death sentence," she told Hall.
The disconnect between Black actors and hair departments is nothing new. Aisha Dee of "The Bold Type" wrote a lengthy Instagram post about her own troubles. "It took three seasons to get someone in the hair department who knew how to work with textured hair," Dee revealed. We only hope such revelations will help change the industry for the better.