Lea Michele Says Glee Cast Didn't Get Closer To Her After Cory Monteith's Death - But Was It Because Of Her Bullying??

Lea Michele hinted at her feud with the Glee cast, and her comments are so telling!

The actress was on Wednesday’s edition of Jake Shane’s podcast Therapuss when she opened up about the challenge of continuing the show after her then-boyfriend Cory Monteith‘s devastating death in 2013. They’d been dating for a year at the time, and it was a truly difficult loss for so many. When the TikTok star wondered if the cast “banded together in a very tight-knit way” after the passing, Lea very clearly stated:

“No.”

Oof.

She went on to clarify that some cast members did grow closer amid the tragedy — but she was clearly on the outside of that:

“I think in some ways it did for certain people, but I think that, for me, it was so hard. I just completely broke. I was really in a one-track mind of just doing my job. It was way too much to try to process at a young age, but I’m very grateful for everyone there. Whether or not they know it, I personally felt a lot of support from everybody in the building helping me to get through.”

That said, it was the crew that she bonded with the most at that time, and she thanked them for “helping [her] get through” it. Trying not to sound too harsh about her co-stars, she added:

“The [crew members] were holding me up so much as well as the people who were on the show. But a lot of people were gone by then, which was hard.”

The Scream Queens alum also pointed out that she felt like she “wasn’t allowed to stop” the show and “had to keep going,” no matter how hard it was at the time. She expressed:

“If we didn’t show up for work, then people wouldn’t have work to go to. That was a lot of pressure for me. I had to put my stuff aside and show up so that everybody could just continue to work.”

We can’t imagine how difficult that must have been for all of them. It’s hard to carry on amid such grief, much less try to be charismatic for the camera. And to do it alone…

But of course, it does really seem like she brought the isolation on herself, right?

In recent years, Lea has been accused by several cast members of being a mean girl on set. Even racist at times! In 2020, Samantha Ware, who played Jane Hayward in Season 6, claimed Lea made work a “living hell” for her through “traumatic microaggressions” on set. Heather Morris later claimed many of the cast were “victims of bullying” thanks to the Funny Girl star, who was “unpleasant” to work with, though many were “scared” to speak up about it while filming. Naya Rivera was one of the first to get candid about her strained relationship with Lea in her 2016 memoir, though she said “the rumors of our ‘feud’ were blown out of proportion.”

Lea later told Interview Magazine that she’d been having “incredibly healing and very eye-opening” conversations behind the scenes with those she’d hurt (though she didn’t specify who). She didn’t get into all the bullying allegations in this latest chat, but what she did say shows just how disconnected she was from the cast!

Hear her full chat (below):