Neutrogena is finally apologizing to Hayden Panettiere — days after her tragic death — for axing her contract in 2015 while she was in the throes of postpartum depression.
In a statement posted to its official Instagram page, the beauty brand said it “understand[s] that [it] made her feel unsupported during a very difficult time.”
“This is not what Neutrogena stands for or who we want to be,” the company added.
Elsewhere in the statement, the company said its “deeply saddened” by the “Heroes” actress’ death.
“For more than a decade, Hayden was a valued member of our Neutrogena community,” the statement continued, with Neutrogena noting that it was “proud to have partnered with her.”
“Hayden’s courage in sharing her challenges helped inspire important conversations and awareness,” it wrote. “We are making a significant investment to a long-standing community health partner to help give more women access to the support they need, including care for postpartum depression.”
Neutrogena vowed to “share more details with this community when plans are in place.”
“Out of respect for Hayden’s family and loved ones, we did not want to speak out so soon following her passing,” the statement concluded. “Everyone at Neutrogena extends their deepest condolences to Hayden’s family and all who loved her.”
The “Heroes” actress claimed in her memoir, “This Is Me: A Reckoning,” that Neutrogena “canceled [her] long-standing contract” over her allegedly breaking a morality clause.
Panettiere revealed that the incident occurred after she admitted to suffering from postpartum depression following the 2014 birth of her daughter, Kaya.
“I labored with Kaya for 14 hours and was in surgery for three hours after she was born,” she wrote in the book, released May 19, revealing her harrowing journey of giving birth to her only child, whom she shared with ex Wladimir Klitschko.
“When I woke up in the recovery room, I was exhausted, disoriented, and racked with pain,” Panettiere said, explaining that she “needed a drink to function.”
After multiple times in “treatment,” the “Scream 4” actress said she wasn’t herself and her struggles at the time cost her her job on “Nashville” — a move that “killed [her] because [she’d] always prided [herself] on [her] professionalism.”
“My fans and the press were hugely sympathetic — and I’ll always be grateful for that — but a part of my career I’d come to depend on suffered,” she wrote, detailing how Neutrogena then canceled their relationship with her in “yet another blow in a year that had given almost nothing else.”
“I had postpartum depression, and it sucked. I wanted more than anything to get back to that place of happiness, but I didn’t even know where that place was anymore,” she said.
Panettiere was first signed with Neutrogena as a spokesperson and face for the brand in 2005, regularly appearing in major worldwide ad campaigns for the company.
The “Bring It On: All or Nothing” actress’ contract ended in the months following her discussing her battle with postpartum depression on “Live! with Kelly and Michael” in September 2015.
During that appearance, she shared that PPD was “something that’s completely uncontrollable” and both “really painful” and “really scary,” emphasizing that “women need a lot of support.”
“Women are amazing,” she added at the time. “We do something that no man can do on this planet. I mean, we grow a human being in our body!”
In her appearance on the “Jay Shetty” podcast in May, Panettiere said Neutrogena firing her over her postpartum depression remarks was “the last thing that I thought they would ever fire me over.”
“When I got that call that Neutrogena wanted to fire me over that, my representative at the time said, ‘That’s illegal. You can’t do that,’” she recalled, noting that the company simply didn’t renew its contract with her when the time came up.
Panettiere died Sunday of an apparent “overdose” at the age of 36.
Following the news of her untimely death, fans took to social media to demand a national boycott of Neutrogena over its treatment of the actress, with one fan writing, “I will never buy one of their products again in my life.”
In a 2023 post on Neutrogena’s Threads account, it had written, “Friends don’t let friends go to bed without removing their makeup 🫶.” This bubbled up following her death, with fans slamming the company in the replies.
“Friends don’t drop friends when they’re suffering but hey,” a netizen commented, with another chiming in, “Well this did not age well. Y’all really did Hayden dirty. You should be ashamed.”
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