How Hayden Panettiere’s Death Led to a Neutrogena Boycott
“We understand that we made her feel very unsupported during a very difficult time,” Neutrogena said in a statement.
Photo: Getty Images, Neutrogena Celebrities Hayden Panettiere
On Sunday night, after the shocking news of Hayden Panettiere’s death broke, the many lives she touched, including friends and co-stars like Viola Davis, Paris Hilton, and Kim Cattrall, memorialized the actress on social media. Panettiere was found unresponsive in a Greenville, South Carolina, apartment, and we have since learned that she suffered a cardiac arrest following an apparent drug overdose.
As we remembered the legacy Panettiere left behind—with her iconic roles in shows like Heroes and Nashville, and classic 2000s flicks like Racing Stripes, Scream IV, Bring It On: All or Nothing, and Ice Princess—interviews were revisited from a press tour she completed just this May, during which she opened up about her struggles with addiction, postpartum depression, surviving sexual assualt, all chronicled in her 2026 memoir: This Is Me: A Reckoning.
In one resurfaced appearance on the Jay Shetty podcast, Panettiere recalled how her 10-year tenure as Neutrogena spokesperson was severed in 2015 after she spoke about postpartum depression on the talk show Live with Kelly and Michael. Here is what Neutrogena allegedly fired her over:
“When they tell you about postpartum depression, you think about—‘OK, I feel negative feelings towards my child. I want to injure my child. I want to hurt my child.’ I’ve never, ever had those feelings. But you … don’t realize [how] broad of a spectrum you can really experience that on, and it’s something I think that needs to be talked about. And women need to know that they’re not alone.”
That was literally it.
“Neutrogena wanted to fire me over that,” she told Shetty in May. “I had worked with these people for 10 years, and I remember not hearing a word from anybody.” Simply by mentioning postpartum depression on live television, Panettiere was told she had violated the morals clause of her ambassadorship, and her contract was not renewed.
“I had no intention of or plan to talk about postpartum depression,” Panettiere added. “It just came up, and I was just being honest. And never for a second did I think that anyone—or care that anyone—would have a bad reaction to it. It was my truth.”
This week, when the story resurfaced, the internet was understandably outraged, prompting a widespread call for a boycott, after which the brand issued a statement:
“We are deeply saddened by Hayden Panettiere’s passing. For more than a decade, Hayden was a valued member of our Neutrogena community. We are proud to have partnered with her, and we understand that we made her feel very unsupported during a very difficult time. This is not what Neutrogena stands for or who we want to be.”
Additionally, activist groups have long included Neutrogena, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary, in boycotts targeting companies with ties to Israel. So if you ever needed more of a reason to swap your body wash, here it is.
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