Sarah Michelle Gellar took on a leading role in protecting her crew and fellow cast mates on the set of Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Gellar started playing the lead role of Buffy Summers on Buffy The Vampire Slayer in 1997 when she was just 18 and continued to lead the show until its conclusion in 2003. The series was created by Joss Whedon and was critically and commercially successful during its original run, earning Gellar a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a Drama Series while also spawning a spinoff show, Angel, which ran from 1999 to 2004.

In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Seth Green, who spent three seasons on the cast of Buffy, spoke in support of Gellar's role on the show's set. The work environment on the set of Buffy has recently come under fire and been called "toxic" largely due to Whedon's alleged abusive and inappropriate behavior. Green claims that rather than using her star status for special treatment, Gellar instead used her power on set to protect the crew and her co-stars from things like unfairly long shooting days and dangerous shots. Read Green's full quote below.

"That show was just hard. We were working crazy hours, and a lot of things that got pushed weren’t necessarily safe or under the best conditions. Sarah was always the first one to say, ‘We agreed this was a 13-hour day, and it’s hour 15 — we’ve got to wrap,’ or, ‘Hey, this shot doesn’t seem safe,’ when nobody else would stick up for the cast and crew. I saw her get called a bitch, a diva, all these things that she’s not — just because she was taking the mantle of saying and doing the right thing."
How Sarah Michelle Gellar Has Upheld The Legacy Of Buffy


Buffy The Vampire Slayer was well-liked when it was airing and afterward developed a cult following that led to countless tie-in products, such as novels, video games, and a comic book series, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season Eight, that serves as a canonical continuation of the story following the show's finale. However, in recent years there have been many Buffy alumni who have spoken out about the way Whedon ran things on the set of the show. Gellar didn't break her silence on her experience on Whedon's set until recently, calling it an "extremely toxic male set."

Gellar also said that because it was one of her first acting experiences, she didn't realize that kind of behavior was actually out of the norm. Now that she has been on sets run by women and men who respect women, she understands just how bad things were on Buffy and is now looking to create a better, more safe environment for young actors to feel comfortable while they're at work. Gellar's legacy is tied to that of the show that made her a star, so the work she's doing to right the wrongs from Buffy on her new show, Wolf Pack, is already doing wonders for public perception of her and Buffy.


Wolf Pack's creator and showrunner, Jeff Davis, has extolled the virtues of having Gellar on set as he deals with a quartet of young actors, even saying that the veteran actress has been as important as the intimacy coordinator for the more racy scenes. Gellar has insisted that her producer credit on Wolf Pack is about wanting to set a tone for the youngsters she's working with, even giving them all her phone numbers so that they can talk to her discreetly about any issues they might have with people on set.​​​​​​​ Gellar is striving to create a safety net for these young actors that she didn't have and doing so with success. The reputations and legacies of both Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Gellar will be all the better for her noble efforts.