racism in hollywood - and how far it has come.

[Manic]

Well, we (black people) have been a hell of a lot more vocal about wanting representation on the whole.

Also, because we've been in America just as long as white people, we're not viewed as outsiders-- relatively speaking. Despite the US' long history of inviting immigrants from all four corner of the globe and a large chunk of the country basically being part of Latin America, anyone who isn't white or black is typically viewed as a foreign outsider by Hollywood.

So in a sense, black people in the US fall slightly more under the "us" category than other non-white groups. We get more attention because of that.

I'm not saying it's anything to be proud of. In a perfect world, Hollywood would be casting more of every race.

 

[KRYPTON INC.]

Will we hear you? Is it ok to turn a character from white to black, but not for other ethnicity/races?

It is quite clear that population wise blacks are represented quite well compared to Asian/Latino/ other ethnicity and races. The Asian population is the largest in the world but gets hardly any representation.

No. You won't be hearing me complain about 99.9% of most "race/ethnicity" changes, given the particular context Captain Cool Spot.

 

[loretta]

We should also remember that Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver aren't white ( they are Jewish-Romani) and in both movies they're played by white actors.Also it's really offensive that in AOU they are volunteers to neo-nazi organization ( I hope that people will stop calling Whedon some kind of feminist god, he only cares about white women) . I actually hate that there was bigger meltdown over Quicksilver costume than whitewashing.

I wonder how many of those who are crying over Human Torch casting are concerned that Doom (who is also Romani) is portrayed by white actor or if there will be any mention that Ben Grimm is Jewish.

 

[SuperT]

We should also remember that Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver aren't white ( they are Jewish-Romani) and in both movies they're played by white actors.Also it's really offensive that in AOU they are volunteers to neo-nazi organization ( I hope that people will stop calling Whedon some kind of feminist god, he only cares about white women) . I actually hate that there was bigger meltdown over Quicksilver costume than whitewashing.

I wonder how many of those who are crying over Human Torch casting are concerned that Doom (who is also Romani) is portrayed by white actor or if there will be any mention that Ben Grimm is Jewish.

Good lord, thank you! I've been thinking this for the longest time. Never understood how people thought Whedon was this bastion of feminist/female writing. His female characterizations are literally ALL the same and he has ZERO minority women amongst his writing outside of Zoe from Firefly.

 

[Manic]

You know, I loved Firefly, but it always bothered me that there were no Asian characters on that show. It took place in a version of the future where society had sprung from both American and Chinese influence, which was why every character was fluent in Mandarin. You know what was noticably absent from the main, supporting, and villain casts? Chinese people. By all rights, River Tam and Kaywinnet Lee Frye should've been played by Chinese actresses.

 

[SuperT]

You know, I loved Firefly, but it always bothered me that there were no Asian characters on that show. It took place in a version of the future where society had sprung from both American and Chinese influence, which was why every character was fluent in Mandarin. You know what was noticably absent from the main, supporting, and villain casts? Chinese people. By all rights, River Tam and Kaywinnet Lee Frye should've been played by Chinese actresses.

Exactly.

 

[chamber-music]

I think perhaps partly why Asian Americans and Latino Americans are under represented in Hollywood is because they think those audiences are being catered to with films from their ancestral countries.

Films made in Latin America and Asia starring native actors are distributed worldwide and produce critically acclaimed films. Asian and Latin American cinema represents people from those backgrounds very well.

Outside of the U.S there isn't really a big amount of films being made with black casts. Nigeria's 'Nollywood', Africa's largest movie industry hasn't really made a big impact on the world cinema stage.

Sony said that The Equalizer starring Denzel didn't do well over seas because it starred a black lead actor. I am like what the heck? I thought it wasn't as racist over seas.

I don't think that would be an issue in Europe. At least not western Europe. I've never met a person who has said they didn't want to see a film because of the race of the actors.

 

[terry78]

I think you have the occasional racist in pretty much every country, they just know how to be subtle about it. Ours tends to wear it on their sleeves.

 

[BatmanVSuperman]

I think perhaps partly why Asian Americans and Latino Americans are under represented in Hollywood is because they think those audiences are being catered to with films from their ancestral countries.

Films made in Latin America and Asia starring native actors are distributed worldwide and produce critically acclaimed films. Asian and Latin American cinema represents people from those backgrounds very well.

Outside of the U.S there isn't really a big amount of films being made with black casts. Nigeria's 'Nollywood', Africa's largest movie industry hasn't really made a big impact on the world cinema stage.



I don't think that would be an issue in Europe. At least not western Europe. I've never met a person who has said they didn't want to see a film because of the race of the actors.

Black Americans are very different culturally from those actually born in Africa. There appears to be much more of a disconnect with where they were born, than compared to Asian and Latin Americans. A new culture developed from being brought up in America. There is noted tension between some sects of Africans and black/African Americans from different ideologies.

 

[SuperT]

I'm not surprised by that sentiment at all - racism against black people is very high in South America and Asia, moreso in Central/South American culture. Afro-hispanic/latino's are completely ignored in about 95% of their media.

 

[BatmanVSuperman]

Many Asians and Latin people speak their "native" language. In contrast, it would be incredibly rare if ever to find a black American who speaks Afroasiatic, Nilo-Saharan, and Niger–Congo African languages. Definitely a huge disconnect comparatively to one's roots while in America.

 

[terry78]

Yeah, pretty much all the asian and latin kids I grew up with had grandparents or other relatives that pretty much switched up their native tongue with english or vice versa all the time. Never had that.

 

[XtremelyBaneful]

Well, we (black people) have been a hell of a lot more vocal about wanting representation on the whole.

Also, because we've been in America just as long as white people, we're not viewed as outsiders-- relatively speaking. Despite the US' long history of inviting immigrants from all four corner of the globe and a large chunk of the country basically being part of Latin America, anyone who isn't white or black is typically viewed as a foreign outsider by Hollywood.

So in a sense, black people in the US fall slightly more under the "us" category than other non-white groups. We get more attention because of that.

I'm not saying it's anything to be proud of. In a perfect world, Hollywood would be casting more of every race.

very well put.

 

[Manic]

Adding to what I wrote before (because it only now occurred to me):

Black Americans tend to have anglicized (read: white) names. If I were to tell you that there was a non-white character in a movie named Carol Baker, you'd probably assume she was black. It probably wouldn't even occur to most people that she could be anything else, because anglicized names like that are common in both the black and white communities in the US. Thus black people are simply more likely to be cast than any other race when a character was conceived without any particular race in mind. And when it comes to racebending white comic book characters, their names are already seen to fit black actors.

Of course, there's a thousand reasons why "Carol Baker" (I basically clicked at random at behindthename.com for this example, btw) might be something other than black or white. She might be racially mixed. She might have married into that name. She might've been adopted. Maybe she's Indian, and "Baker" is an extremely anglicized form of her family's original surname that was changed by the British. Maybe she's Native American, and her family has a made up surname that one of her recent ancestors was forced to think up when they were similarly anglicized (seriously, "Smith" is a fairly common surname among NA's because of this).

But nobody in Hollywood would even think to make this "Carol" character any other race unless her surname sounded like it belonged to a particular ethnicity. The fact that comedian Aziz Ansari got cast as a dude named Tom Haverford is a miracle in itself, because I can guarantee you that nobody in the writers' room conceived that character as Indian-American.

 

[chaseter]

Lucy Liu plays Joan Watson. She was Alex Munday 15 years ago.

 

[CmdrShep2154]

Racism has no place in the 21st Century!

 

[Kane52630]

 

[Octoberist]

Good lord, thank you! I've been thinking this for the longest time. Never understood how people thought Whedon was this bastion of feminist/female writing. His female characterizations are literally ALL the same and he has ZERO minority women amongst his writing outside of Zoe from Firefly.

Does Agents of Shield count? You have two Asian women on the show, though I'm not too sure if Skye is written to be race-less or not.

 

[Moridin]

Good lord, thank you! I've been thinking this for the longest time. Never understood how people thought Whedon was this bastion of feminist/female writing. His female characterizations are literally ALL the same and he has ZERO minority women amongst his writing outside of Zoe from Firefly.

 

[SV Fan]

Does Agents of Shield count? You have two Asian women on the show, though I'm not too sure if Skye is written to be race-less or not.

Well Skye does have some alien blood in her so..... :P

 

[XtremelyBaneful]

Adding to what I wrote before (because it only now occurred to me):

Black Americans tend to have anglicized (read: white) names. If I were to tell you that there was a non-white character in a movie named Carol Baker, you'd probably assume she was black. It probably wouldn't even occur to most people that she could be anything else, because anglicized names like that are common in both the black and white communities in the US. Thus black people are simply more likely to be cast than any other race when a character was conceived without any particular race in mind. And when it comes to racebending white comic book characters, their names are already seen to fit black actors.

Of course, there's a thousand reasons why "Carol Baker" (I basically clicked at random at behindthename.com for this example, btw) might be something other than black or white. She might be racially mixed. She might have married into that name. She might've been adopted. Maybe she's Indian, and "Baker" is an extremely anglicized form of her family's original surname that was changed by the British. Maybe she's Native American, and her family has a made up surname that one of her recent ancestors was forced to think up when they were similarly anglicized (seriously, "Smith" is a fairly common surname among NA's because of this).

But nobody in Hollywood would even think to make this "Carol" character any other race unless her surname sounded like it belonged to a particular ethnicity. The fact that comedian Aziz Ansari got cast as a dude named Tom Haverford is a miracle in itself, because I can guarantee you that nobody in the writers' room conceived that character as Indian-American.

I see what you're saying, but this could be due to the fact that Asian and brown people in reality tend to have ethnic-bound names. So I think the important thing to do would be to first write the role without any racial bias (if it is not a racial role), and then when the right candidate is cast, make the name for the character and make it ethnic if it is seems necessary. Glenn on the walking dead for example comes from the korean character in the comic, but aside from the character's name (glenn rhee) and a few racial jokes here and there, his race is not relevant to his role in the story.

 

[Manic]

Well, that brings us back a few pages to the issue of racially-biased casting calls. If a character's race isn't specified in the script, they usually send out casting calls specifically for white actors. If a non-white actor is lucky, their agent will catch wind and send them on the audition anyway.

 

[MadVillainy]

This was brought up with Fast Five's release and I brought it up again with Fast 6...
Furious 7 came out. Predominately ethnic cast, predominately hip hop/reggateon/ethnic music, set in very diverse, international locations and it still did big numbers.

 

[terry78]

Yeah, it's not viewed as an "ethnic" movie by any means. I do wonder how the flicks would do without one white guy in the cast though. Brian become less of the lead hero as the flicks went on, but he was more co-leader with Dom.

 

[Greens]

Some interesting Furious 7 stats http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/furious-7-audience-75-percent-786452

According to Universal, 75 percent of the audience in North America was non-Caucasian, generally in line with previous installments. Hispanics, the most frequent moviegoers in the U.S., made up the majority of ticket buyers (37 percent), followed by Caucasians (25 percent), African-Americans (24 percent), Asians (10 percent) and other (4 percent).

"The importance of diversity of the ensemble cast in the Fast and Furious franchise has been an integral part of the success of the brand," said Rentrak box office analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "There is literally someone within the cast that is relatable on some level to nearly every moviegoer around the world, and this has paid big dividends at the box office and also in terms of how casting decisions will be made in the future for these types of large-scale action epics."

Dergarabedian and other box office pundits are hard-pressed to think of another franchise that is as ethnically diverse, even as Hollywood in general is criticized for a lack of diversity both behind and in front of the camera.