diff --git a/src/_pytest/terminal.py b/src/_pytest/terminal.py
index 771e6a83593..4d233d55eb6 100644
--- a/src/_pytest/terminal.py
+++ b/src/_pytest/terminal.py
@@ -998,7 +998,7 @@ def _get_line_with_reprcrash_message(config, rep, termwidth):
                     # u'😄' will result in a High Surrogate (U+D83D) character, which is
                     # rendered as u'�'; in this case we just strip that character out as it
                     # serves no purpose being rendered
-                    msg = msg.rstrip(u"\uD83D")
+                    msg = msg.rstrip("\uD83D")
                 msg += ellipsis
             line += sep + msg
     return line