Don’t ask Anthony Mackie for a selfie if you see him out in public.
The Twisted Metal actor, 45, recently joined the Hollywood Reporter for a Comedy Actor Roundtable where he discussed his reluctance to take photos with fans who catch him out in public.
Mackie has faced criticism for shutting down fan interactions as recently as March, when TikTok user Laci Kole shared a video recounting a negative encounter she had with him at a gas station in New Orleans.
Kole claims she saw the Marvel mainstay in a “huge” blacked-out truck with his windows down. She respectfully approached, but he allegedly put his hand in her face and merely said “no.”
“I just wanted to be like, ‘Hey, Anthony Mackie, it's so nice to meet you. Your work is actually phenomenal. I'm so glad I got to meet you. Have an amazing day.’ That was it,” said Kole on TikTok. “That was all I wanted. But these fucking celebrities make it seem like we're fucking roaches and rats, bitch. I'm at the same gas station as you, bitch…Anthony Mackie, the rudest celebrity. You make celebrities look bad.”
A similar report hit last October, when a mother chided Mackie for not taking a pic with her son.
At the THR roundtable, TV features editor Mikey O’Connell posed a question for the actors, which included Bowen Yang, 33, John Goodman, 71, Kelsey Grammer, 69, Ricky Martin, 52, and Theo James, 39.
“What’s the inevitable question that you always get asked that you just never want to hear again?” asked O’Connell.
“Mine is 'take a picture,'” said Mackie at the 43:40 mark in the video up top.
“You don't know what social reality you're tying yourself to. You don't know what that person [is] going to use that picture for,” he added. "Because of the Kardashians, we're kind of put in this reality where we’re looked at as tools, as vessels, as opposed to artists.”
Mackie continued, “There's been several experiences now where people have taken a picture with me and used them for ways that I don't deem the right way. So because of that, I choose not to be a part of your social reality.”
He added, “I have people tell me all the time, ‘Well, this is what you signed up for.’ I’m like, ‘That's crazy.’ That's like telling a girl that because she put on a cute dress and went to a bar, she signed up for me to harass her all night. No. In this day and age we literally learn that we have to respect everyone's ‘no.’ So if I tell you ‘no,’ respect it, and there’s a reason for that.”
