“I can’t mount a film of this budget, where I have to rely on tax rebates in Spain, and say that my lead actor is Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such. I’m just not going to get it financed. So the question doesn’t even come up.” Ridley Scott.
“We looked at Native American actresses. We looked at African-American actresses. We looked at African actresses. We looked at Middle Eastern actresses. White actresses. After a very exhaustive casting process, we ultimately went with the best actress for the part.” - "A ‘Pan’ Insider".
“If you’re going to wait around to find the perfect actress who is a quarter Asian, and not just a quarter Asian but a quarter Hawaiian Asian, you will never cast your movie.” Anonymous Producer regarding ‘Aloha’
There you have it folks, just some of the excuses given for whitewashing. Yikes. Even Emma looks embarrassed.
Time and time again directors and casting agents claim that the role just went to ‘the best actor’ or that there simply wasn’t an appropriate actor of the correct ethnicity around to play the role. Claims of ‘colour-blind’ casting which turn into whitewashed films are typical of mainstream films, but where does that leave POC actors, and what roles are left for them?
In July last year, Jon Ronson of GQ wrote an article ‘You May Know Me from Such Roles as Terrorist #4’ profiling seven muslim-american actors trying to ‘make it’ in Hollywood. These actors’ CVs consist of terrorists and other villains, 2 dimensional roles that never make it to the end alive. Many of them expressed their dismay at constantly playing racist and stereotypical characters, but said any attempt to reject this roles became shortlived as it was all that was out there.
One of the actors Ronson interveiws, Navid Negahban, said that it was important for middle eastern actors to keep accepting terrorist roles or they too would be given to someone who wasn’t middle eastern. According to Navid, the only way to change the characters is for the actor to give them depth. This seems bitter-sweet to me, is the best a muslim-american actor can hope for a better death on screen?
So lets visualize this with an extremely well crafted (not at all made on paint) flow chart as a very simplified summary of this cycle of Hollywood whitewashing:
The Hollywood system is surely harsh and difficult on all actors, however undoubtedly POC actors have the worst of it. The system doesn't give "Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such" a chance to become the kind of star Ridley Scott claims he needed, leaving our block busters stuck in an endless loop of bland, white, cinema.
If you'd like to read more of Ronson's article click here
To read more about excuses from Hollywood people click here
For a list of 84 films by and about women of colour to cleanse yourself of our white male hegemony click here
It's incredible that despite this going on for as long as cinema has been around (cue the particularly cringe-worthy example from 'Breakfast at Tiffany's') its only with the #oscarssowhite movement that this has really become noticed. Whiteness is so naturalized and 'common-sense' that under that lens you could argue there is actually nothing to notice at all because that is simply 'how it is'. It will be very interesting to see whether or anything will change in the near future, simply because it has to start at the top of the pyramid; the directors, as you have illustrated, have little power if they really want their film to get made. It will take a pretty major overhaul to see any 'noticeable' changes in Hollywood.
ReplyDeleteThere's a great video created by comedian John Oliver who addresses this topic very well. I also want to go into the economics of Television and Film to further back up your argument and how irrational it is to naturalize someone of European ancestry as the norm in American films and Television. As assumed, television and film are crafts which are meant to reflect and heighten the experiences of life through out its conceptualization up until the 90's we could also claim that there was a good reason behind the naturalization of people of European descent in media as their purchasing power far outweiged any other ethnic identity in the States. However, this is no longer true for today. In the 2014 annual Motion Picture Association of America report Latino's made up 32% of the those who were frequent movie goers in the States in comparison to their population accounting for an adjusted 86% likelihood for watching films in downtime, in comparison while people of European descent accounted for 64% total tickets purchased when adjusted for their population in the States that was only 77%. Basically, in terms watching films as an activity in ratio to the total population someone of Latino ethnic background is more likely to watch a film in cinemas than a person of European descent in America. Now lets take this back to the initial argument that art imitates life, if that was truly the case then Latino actors and actresses should be the ones normalized in American media not European descent actors/actresses. Therefore, nor do I buy the argument of tailoring cast to the market or that there just isn't an actor available.
ReplyDeleteThis is very true; the Hollywood Film Industry throughout the years has been focused around white actors impersonating different ethnical roles, which has indeed lead to this cycle of “Hollywood Whitewashing”. I agree with what you are stating and it is very true especially back a few years ago when coloured people were not allowed on TV at all. Although it is impressive to see such actors act out a different culture and to do the accent very well, there is this sense of only white people (whitewashing) shown and colour skin people are never the main character. You may get the occasional coloured person in the background or shown as a slave but that is it. The flow chart in which you have presented is exactly right on how the Hollywood industry is whitewashing. However, as time has gone on we are starting to see a trend of politically correctness due to a few old films being remade or continued the storyline in order to change this forever ongoing trend. For example, the new Star Wars. Which has the main character as a coloured male that was not shown within the previously made movies before it. Thus, to see this it will be interesting to see if they continue with this trend of correcting such films created in the past in order to evolve this sense of whitewashing.
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