Jennette McCurdy's book fueled rumors about Dan Schneider, a kids-TV legend. Crew members, writers, and ex-stars reveal what working for him was like.

The goo, roughly the consistency of an egg white, was being squirted repeatedly on the teen actor Jaime Lynn Spears' face.

Spears was shooting an episode of Nickelodeon's "Zoey 101" in which a costar accidentally sprays her with a yellowish-green liquid candy called a "goo pop."

But Dan Schneider, the show's meticulous creator, found problems with every take, Spears' costar Alexa Nikolas recalled, making a crew member squirt the syringe of goo at Spears over and over again.

Then, in one take, the slime hit Spears squarely on her forehead, dripping down her face and mouth.

Schneider started laughing hysterically, Nikolas said. Others laughed as well, including Spears' mother, who was on set at the time. Nikolas said she heard one of her male teenage castmates say, "It's like a cum shot."

That was the shot that made it into the show.

"We're talking about a minor," Nikolas said. "I think Jamie was 13, and they're squirting stuff on her face to make it look a certain way."

(Russell Hicks, Nickelodeon's former president of content and production, said that a standards-and-practices group read every script for Schneider's shows, that programming executives watched every episode, and that parents and caregivers were always on set. "Every single thing that Dan ever did on any of his shows was carefully scrutinized and approved," Hicks wrote in a statement to Insider.)

(A person close to Schneider said that "the 'goo' was green, just like Nickelodeon's famous slime," adding: "This episode aired and was seen by millions of people and (to our knowledge) not one viewer ever had a concern.")

At the time, around 2004, Schneider was on his way to becoming one of the most powerful people at Nickelodeon. Schneider joined the network in 1993 as a writer on "All That." His first series, "The Amanda Show," starring Amanda Bynes, established his brand of kid-friendly slapstick comedy. Subsequent hits like "Zoey 101," "iCarly," and "Victorious" helped turn Nickelodeon into a $10 billion-plus powerhouse, leading The New York Times to crown Schneider "the Norman Lear of children's television."

A heavyset former child star with a round face and rumpled button-downs, Schneider was obsessively hands-on as the creator, executive producer, and writer on his shows, according to his cast and crew. He maintained a constant presence on the set, chatting with teenage casts for hours after filming ended. Winning Schneider over could be a career-making move; he was known to craft bigger roles and even new series for his favorites.

"He was what every kid star wanted," said Nikolas, who played Nicole Bristow on "Zoey 101." "They wanted to be on his show."

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    Schneider's power at Nickelodeon meant his shows continued to be greenlighted despite allegations that he created a hostile work environment.

    It also meant he could push the envelope more than your typical show creator, some people who worked with him said.

    One writer recalled Schneider receiving an email with a few minor notes from Nickelodeon's standards department. Schneider displayed the email on a large monitor in the writers room. Instead of addressing concerns, the writer said, Schneider responded point by point with gibberish — writing "flippity floo" and "flippity flam" — to "make this big show of thumbing his nose at the network." On-set employees rarely pushed back against Schneider, another writer said, because "you just didn't cross Dan — he was a really scary presence."

    And while the network had a multitiered system to review content before it aired, some said it did not always succeed in preventing footage that could be viewed as inappropriate.

    Two people recalled Schneider fighting with Nickelodeon over teenage actresses' costumes on "Victorious," with Schneider — who signed off on all outfits — campaigning for the skimpier options.

    In one battle, the network thought a skirt for Justice, then 17, was too short, while Schneider thought it was perfect, according to a writer and the costumer Kerry Mellin. The writer said Nickelodeon and Schneider compromised by making the skirt "3 inches longer."

    Daniella Monet, who started filming "Victorious" when she was 18, making her the eldest of the teenage cast members, told Insider some of the actors' outfits were "not age appropriate."

    "I wouldn't even wear some of that today as an adult," Monet added.

    Swimwear was also a contested topic, a different writer said, as Schneider campaigned for teen actresses to wear "whatever was the most revealing." In her memoir, McCurdy wrote that she was pressured to wear a bikini on "iCarly," with the head of wardrobe telling her The Creator explicitly asked for two-piece swimsuits.

    The person close to Schneider said all costumes "were seen and approved by dozens of people, including the parents of the actors, and the state-licensed teachers on set." Mellin said that no one would force child actors to wear outfits if they voiced discomfort and that she did not feel Nickelodeon sexualized child actors more than other shows did.

    However, she said, people were reluctant to voice concerns to Schneider because they wanted to keep their jobs.

    "It's an imbalance of power," Mellin said. "Jennette felt it, the designer felt it, I felt it, all of us feel it."

    Innuendo is not uncommon on children's television; the person close to Schneider said Schneider would "include some jokes intended for the parents." But four writers and crew members said Schneider proposed scenes they felt were overly sexual for teenagers on a children's show.

    A video showing scenes from Grande's time on "Victorious" went viral this summer; it includes several shots of Grande putting her big toe in her mouth, as well as pouring water on herself as she hangs upside down on her bed.

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      One scene shows Grande with her eyes closed, moaning and squeezing a potato in both hands, begging it to "give up the juice." The sketch, as well as the ones involving Grande's nibbling her toe and pouring water on herself, is from a series of online extras that a database from Writers Guild of America West credits Schneider with writing. (A person close to Schneider said that these credits were "part of Dan's deal to get writing credit" but that these "specific sketches referred to were not written by Dan.") Two writers said Schneider was almost singularly responsible for this online content, which they felt could sometimes be inappropriate, especially in the early seasons of "Victorious" when the Grande sketches were filmed. One said writers "largely avoided set when the web shows were being shot because they were largely very cringe."

      The longtime Nickelodeon writer recalled feeling uncomfortable with another online extra in which the cast rubbed food on Victoria Justice's exposed midriff, turning her "into a hamburger" and squirting her with condiments. Monet said that after filming a "Victorious" scene in which she ate a pickle while applying lip gloss, she reached out to the network to express concern that it may be too sexual to air. The network aired it anyway.

      Monet emphasized that Schneider is not the only one to blame. The network, as well as the department of standards and practices, had to sign off on everything. Monet added that Schneider's male-dominated writers rooms could result in some hypersexualized content.

      Most of "Victorious," Monet said, was "very PC, funny, silly, friendly, chill."

      "But once in a while," she said, there'd be a moment like the pickle scene.

      "Do I wish certain things, like, didn't have to be so sexualized?" Monet said. "Yeah. A hundred percent."

      For years Schneider's behavior went unchecked by Nickelodeon as he created hit after hit.

      Then, in 2013, Nickelodeon launched an investigation into inappropriate behavior on the set of "Sam & Cat" after complaints from McCurdy and Grande about a producer on the show, someone with knowledge of the investigation said. They said the investigation concluded that Schneider had contributed to the "toxicity."

      McCurdy wrote in her memoir that The Creator was "no longer allowed to be on set with any actors." Two people who worked at Nickelodeon at the time corroborated this to Insider.