Whitewashing in film is the practice of casting a white Actor for a role originally intended for someone of colour. In a previous article I wrote about white Actors donning black, brown, or yellow-face to “accurately” play minority roles, but this time I thought I’d write about something much more insidious, an attempt by mainstream entertainment to completely remove any traces of colour from film. In my opinion whitewashing is much more damaging than wearing black-face, instead of merely mocking or stereotyping the character whilst acknowledging the actual race, with whitewashing the true ethnicity is completely ignored in favour of a white, usually European person. This has a long-lasting effect on society, take the role of Jesus as an example, he is frequently played by white Actors including Max Von Sydow, Willem Dafoe, and Jim Caviezel. Because white Actors are always favoured to play Jesus Christ, as an extension to Fine Art representations of him, over the years most of the public has been brainwashed into thinking the original incarnation was also white. This also applies to Moses (famously played by Charlton Heston) and Cleopatra (played by Elizabeth Taylor) but even in the present day we’ve had an Angelina Jolie version of Cleopatra in the works and Actors such as Christian Bale have played Moses. The fact that Jesus and Moses may never have existed is a whole different argument, but since a huge proportion of the world chooses to deify people from the Middle East and North Africa, why then can’t their filmic representations be racially and ethnically accurate?
Once we acknowledge that whitewashing happens just as much in the present as it does in the past, the excuse of an “ignorant” and “uneducated” bygone era can no longer be used. But why does whitewashing still occur today? In my opinion, whether the original character is fictional or not, whitewashing serves as a long-term propaganda method to remove people of colour from our history, and unfortunately for us, contemporary entertainment hasn’t given up this racist tactic of Caucasian self-promotion.
Take a look at films released in the last several years and it’s clear that whitewashing is definitely not something that only occurred in the past. We’ve had numerous occasions in our post-millennial so-called “modern society” in which whitewashing has been practised; in 2005 Christopher Nolan cast the white Irish Liam Neeson to play Ra’s Al Ghul in Batman Begins despite the character being of Arabic decent in the comic books. In 2010 Jake Gyllenhaal played a Persian in Prince Of Persia: Sands Of Time and in 2012 the olive-skinned, black-haired Katniss Everdeen in Hunger Games was played by Jennifer Lawrence, the whole metaphor of real-life oppression, classism, and racial division being lost with the film adaptation. In 2013 Johnny Depp played the Native American Tonto in The Lone Ranger, in 2014 we had in an entirely white cast in Noah and later in the same year we had Ridley Scott’s Exodus: Gods And Kings in which white actors played Egyptians. In 2015 the Native American character Tiger Lily was played by the overrated rich twit Rooney Mara in Pan and serial offender Ridley Scott also cast a white Canadian to play a Korean American in The Martian. In 2016 we have Gods Of Egypt starring Gerard Butler who along with other white Actors is playing an Egyptian, and if you take a look at IMDb we have many more whitewashed movies in development.
Whitewashing also occurs outside of the world of fiction, in World Trade Center, Oliver Stone‘s “true story” concerning 9/11, Stone whitewashed the role of Marine Sargeant Jason Thomas who in real life is African American. A year later in the 2007 film A Mighty Heart, Angelina Jolie played the real life character of Mariane Pearl, an Afro-Cuban French woman. Then in 2010 in another “true story” David Fincher cast a white British actor to play the Indian American Divya Narendra in The Social Network and in 2012, Ben Affleck played a half Mexican CIA Agent in Argo. These real-life instances of whitewashing are much worse than casting white Actors in fiction, since the whitewashing of true stories conceals the key involvement and sometimes heroism during historic events by people of colour.
I have to point out that these aren’t the only occurrences of whitewashing that exist, these are only a handful that I’ve selected for this article, you can find many more online. But the amount of whitewashing isn’t the only offensive part of the equation, for me the excuses from the filmmakers themselves are the epitome of insulting, namely the idea of the “bankable” white Actor. When it came to defending Exodus: Gods And Kings for example, Ridley Scott said; “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 Mohammed so-and-so from such-and-such. I’m just not going to get it financed. So the question doesn’t even come up”. So instead of making sure that the script was well-written and entertaining, this prick instead put all his focus on receiving tax rebates? I mean what was the priority here, making an accurate and watchable film or saving some money? But hilariously, Exodus bombed faster than Tony Scott leaping off the Vincent Thomas Bridge, hopefully a sign to Hollywood to focus more on accuracy rather than propaganda and profit.
It’s always great to see films like Exodus, The Lone Ranger, and Pan turning out to be flops, the more this occurs the less they can use the excuse of “bankability” since in each of these cases a white saviour wasn’t enough to detract from these pitiful regurgitations of filmic trash. We’ll have to wait and see if Gods Of Egypt starring the über-un-Egyptian Gerard Butler is enough to save the film from dying an unprofitable death.
Despite a larger section of society bringing this issue to the forefront, there are still imbeciles out there who defend whitewashing. On certain IMDb forums for instance, you can still find numerous people saying that a white Actor is preferable because they’re either a. better at acting b. a bigger box office draw, or c. when it comes to Egypt in movies, since Ancient Egyptians were a mix of ethnicities a white person is according to them more “accurate”. When it comes to the Middle East and North Africa specifically, Hollywood and their supporters need to realise that regardless of which Egyptian Dynasty they’re trying to depict, nobody in the history of the country (or in the entire continent of Africa for that matter) ever looked like Mike pissing Banning, Bruce frigging Wayne or Jessie fucking Pinkman. To the defenders of this type of excuse I also have to ask, how the fuck can we ever have a bankable black “box office draw” if we never let a minority Actor act in a role intended for them? This article proves that if each of the roles intended for minorities were given to minorities, there might one day be parity between races in entertainment.
Outside of Africa and the Middle East, and away from Biblical stories, we’ve also had the piss-poor excuse of “ethnic vilification”. The excuse of casting Benedict Cumberbatch to play Khan Noonien Singh in Star Trek Into Darkness was that they didn’t want to demonise minorities. Co-producer and co-screenwriter Bob Orci said; “Basically, as we went through the casting process and we began honing in on the themes of the movie, it became uncomfortable for me to support demonising anyone of colour, particularly any one of Middle Eastern descent or anyone evoking that. One of the points of the movie is that we must be careful about the villain within us, not some other race”. Firstly, it seems that the Co-Producer can’t even tell the difference between an Indian and a Middle Eastern person, but this hypocritical stance seems to be just another way of deflecting from Hollywood’s penchant for whitewashing. People like Orci can’t seem to explain why mainstream Hollywood can make Islamophobic films like American Sniper and Zero Dark Thirty but Allah-forbid they cast a brown Actor to play a brown fictitious villain. The role of Khan by the way, was written by Gene Roddenberry in the 1960’s and it was based on an Indian friend who Roddenberry served with during the Second World War. The principle characteristics of Khan was intelligence and superior genes, so surely accurately casting this role was befitting to the writer’s intentions? But whatever the writer’s original intent, when it comes to ethnic minority characters being translated to film, these Hollywood pricks seem to constantly reach into their arsenal of bullshit excuses to justify their prejudice, whether the film in question is historical fact or fantasy fiction.
At this point you might ask, doesn’t this colour-blind casting happen the other way round? And the answer is yes, but Actors such as Idris Elba appearing in Thor or Michael B. Jordan being cast in the Fantastic 4 are few and far between. The list of minority Actors playing white roles is not only short, it’s also less important. You have to ask yourself what’s worse, a white man playing Jesus or a black man playing Jim West?
So let’s call this what is so obviously is… racism. I’m sick of the excuses, ranging from bankability to demonisation, if a Producer or Director chooses to cast a white Actor for a role intended for a person of colour it’s not only lazy it’s racist. In our contemporary society where we’re incessantly told that we’ve made so much progress, why can’t a simple piece of entertainment be cast correctly? The public wonders why people of colour aren’t nominated for the Oscars, some morons even saying that minority Actors were “out-acted” and therefore weren’t deserving of such awards. These same fools fail to acknowledge however, that Hollywood and the entertainment business as a whole only puts forward people of colour if the role itself reinforces stereotypes, they also fail to acknowledge that hundreds of famous white actors are marketed to the masses but only several black actors are promoted with the same levels of enthusiasm and financial backing. The lack of minorities in Hollywood isn’t because there aren’t as many ethnic minority Actors out there trying to make it, just that institutional racism keeps up-and-coming black actors from becoming famous and recognised, take a look at my article about The Academy Awards to see the stereotypical roles that resulted in a win, the whole system from casting to accolading is rife with prejudice.
You can either laugh at or be offended by the posters that accompany this article, but what’s the difference between these parodies and the films that have been made by Hollywood? The truth is that there really is no difference in Angelina Jolie playing Cleopatra or Rosa Parks, so why is there such little uproar when a whitewashed minority character outside of our grasp of history appears in the movies? What will it take for the masses to finally say they’ve had enough? Gerard Butler as Malcolm X?
In the early 1900’s, Peter Pan was written by J.M. Barrie and despite him writing that Tiger Lily was a princess of “a Piccaninny tribe” the character was still an ethnic minority. Around a hundred years earlier in the late 1800’s, Jules Verne wrote Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea and included a prominent Indian character (Captain Nemo) who had a hatred of British Imperialism. Hell, even as far back as 1603, William Shakespeare wrote Othello, in which the central character was a Moorish General. So even as far back as the 1600’s, white playwrights and novelists wrote about people of colour, even dedicating whole novels to them and making them central characters, but more than four hundred years or four centuries later, white Producers and white Directors can’t cast ethnic minorities not only in these old roles but as characters written this century? Oh, how far we’ve come.
Knowing who is in charge of the media and the entertainment business, it’s not surprising that whitewashing still occurs. A rich, old, white, heterosexual male will probably always be racist, and if you think that sentence is prejudice, then you know how we minorities feel when we’re confronted with a whitewashed film. If minority Actors have to constantly “prove” themselves to be worthy of casting, then these old white Executives in charge of Hollywood should also prove that they’re not a bunch of antiquated racists. If they’re not hateful bigots who get off on the idea of feeling superior, then maybe start casting films correctly, if not then stay the fuck away from the past. The next time they tell us tall tales about history don’t buy a ticket and don’t support their propaganda, at some point a string of unprofitable movies will be enough of a message.
Technicolour.
Categories: Artwork, Film And Movies
Realisation of being genetically recessive and inferior. But powerful via capitalism, imperialism trades and stolen knowledge. They have the means to portray and sell the illusion of being genetically superior and alpha origin of the species.
No, Gerard Butler is not enough to save whatever Egyptian movie Hollywood is messing up this year. He’s just not. I particularly don’t understand the excuse of hiring known white actors for these roles, when they pair these known actors with white actors no one has heard of, or cares about.
This excuse is especially galling when it comes to fantasy films set in medieval Europe. I keep hearing the argument that PoC hadn’t been invented back then or something to that effect. The arguments white people come up with to excuse their utter foolishness, make you wanna ” just choke a B***”, sometimes.
And when they cast Michael B Jordan as Johnny Storm or when there are reports that Idris Elba will replace Daniel Craig as James Bond, people will whine on social media like a spoiled child. But they wouldn’t complain when a white actor plays a minority character? The hypocrisy is astounding! When will this bullshit stop? When people finally say enough is enough? I bet if Ridley Scott directs a film about the Black Panthers with a cast of white actors then people will start to reconsider.
great article, cant believe this is still happening wtf
At first this website was refreshing. It was refreshing to see real criticism that wasn’t mired in politics or wasn’t a puff piece.
but it’s degenerated into whining from a humorless social justice warrior. One can’t hide one’s colors for long.
The present cultural landscape, the one where shows like Big Bang Theory dominates, and comedy has more or less been banned because someone could possibly be offended or oppressed by a joke–has already been shaped in your image. But, being “greedy” as you are but pretend you’re not because you don’t work on Wall Street, you cannot possibly be satisfied.
Humans can only seem to go from extremes–you denounce one extreme by unknowingly espousing another.
It’s a running theme on this website and is why your criticism should be met with a swift kick.
Please expand on “at first this website was refreshing” – you mean you read these articles in order from “What Went Wrong With… Art” or you started reading them today in reverse order? I doubt that if you were a fan from 2012 it would take you over 4 years to complain.
You also need to go into more detail about your opinion – which articles according to you are “refreshing” and which are not? Which extreme am I denouncing and which extreme am I espousing? In addition, how has comedy been “shaped in my image” when I’m against censorship (maybe read my articles about Azealia Banks or Urban Myths)? There is a difference between wanting change or simply wanting your voice heard and wanting something banned, maybe get your facts straight before you assume incorrect bullshit about my stance on entertainment and comedy. And by the way, the final sentence from your second paragraph about “greed” and “Wall Street” makes no sense whatsoever.
Also, I can’t see how you can say I’m leaning one way or another when I denounce both right-wing and left-wing celebs and mock people from both sides of the political divide.
What also makes no sense is that for some reason you think that a humorous person can’t also be a proponent for social justice, as if someone can have a fixed position and one-sided personality – one day shit is funny, another it’s serious – these articles reflect that. And pray tell, how can “one” comment on popular culture without involving politics? It’s engrained into our very society and it affects almost all aspects of our day to day lives.
The fact that you left your comment below this particular article, I can see what kind of person you are, not to mention where your point of view lies. Social justice as you put it, or equality as I would put it, is long due in the entertainment world. You’d get a good hard kick to your balls as a response to your predictable waffle.
“And by the way, the final sentence from your second paragraph about “greed” and “Wall Street” makes no sense whatsoever.”
Greed means wanting more and more, not being satisfied with what one has. One doesn’t have to be a
business tycoon to demand more and more concessions from others. Complaining about whitewashing is a crusade it is something that will never be rectified because many times people do not have a qualified person available to fill in as a ethnic group.
” There is a difference between wanting change or simply wanting your voice heard and wanting something banned”
Sounds like you want to ban whitewashing by casting it as something offensive. Movies haven’t had a stellar reputation for being historically accurate. Sometimes, there is a financial penalty for making something accurate–making an Iron Man villain Chinese as he was in the Iron Man comic books might get an Iron Man comic banned by the Chinese government. Domestically, privileged and pampered SJWs will tweet about how racist and Chinesephobic the Chinese Iron Man villain is.
That is one example. There are many others. If reality is unpleasant, it gets swept under the rug.
” Social justice as you put it, or equality as I would put it, is long due in the entertainment world. ”
The entertainment world (meaning OECD markets) is whiter than it was when I was a kid.
High profile actors and singers today are more white than they were in say, 1996, even if more of them are gay.
Seeing more token gay and the odd black character on screen doesn’t change thing. There can never be equality in the entertainment world because not everyone is interested in seeing the same things. I acknowledge there is a cultural pecking order where –straight upper class European people are looked upon more favorably than a slum-dwelling Muslim–not because of racism but because the Europeans enjoy a better lifestyle than the slum-dwelling Muslim. The entertainment consuming public to a large degree aspires to live like Europeans. Conversely, outside of a handful of rich countries, no one cares about multiculturalism. Most people on this planet live in monocultures ,where everyone looks the same and has the same values. A significant source of conflict in their lives is when they come in contact with people who look different from them have different ,irreconcilable values, and have materially different lifestyles than them. If they aren’t affluent, they feel a great deal of social exclusion. Social inclusion is very expensive. There’s a reason why it is only in rich countries do minorities have rights Only in rich countries are low status people being taken seriously about not feeling acknowledged or as important than higher status, and that is with the help of very wealthy philanthropists and a expensive college academic system that aspires to replace organized religion.
“You’d get a good hard kick to your balls as a response to your predictable waffle.”
I’d make a similar comment but I realize that you may have already castrated yourself for the original sin of being born a CIS white male.
A lot of assumptions and contradictions so I’ll break it down:
If diversity aligned itself with the bottom line than there would be more diversity in the entertainment industry.
Minorities are minorities often because their appeal or desirability is limited (the only people who honestly want to see more minorities in media are other minorities. The outraged white sjw is a minority) or because they are disproportionately poor.(they provide little demand since they earn little money.) I remember when UPN was the “black tv network”. What happened to it? It looks like UPN couldn’t sell advertising time for as much money as if they had whiter or people with higher income. The finances behind television doesn’t lend itself to diversity–it lends itself towards content for upper middle class people, who despite their skin color, look or aspire to live like upper middle class Europeans and or reality tv, where people humiliate themselves for our gratification. It’s incredibly naive to expect diversity to be represented in entertainment while day-to-day life is and is becoming more socioeconomically segregated.
“If Hollywood put a little more effort in hiring people of colour for roles not initially intended for them, ”
On a creative level that doesn’t really work. Hollywood HAS done that. I suspect what is holding them back is that they are finding out that international audiences don’t care about diversity. Most of the world is close-minded and is somewhat racist. I wonder if Will Smith had been a few shades black, if he would have enjoyed the success he’s had globally.
” With these people whitewashing it’s obviously conscious or subconscious prejudice.” It’s only prejudice when a white male does it. I think there are plenty of hatred on the Left as well but we can’t call a spade a spade.
If a Muslim demands a Muslim superhero movie, because that’s what we watch now, with an all Muslim cast, it’s not bigoted.
If a Christian demands that, that Christian is oppressing other people. What sense does that make?
Equality is the wrong term here because many people are ambitious , or “greedy” and are not content with equality. They want to dominate other people and eliminate views or people they find undesirable.
“Striving for change isn’t a crusade, because unlike the Christians in the 11th to 13th centuries I don’t want the predominant people (in this case entertainment) to completely disappear” Speak for yourself and only yourself. There are too many Progressives with a rabid hatred for Old White Men. and aren’t striving for change–they are demanding it and accusing anyone who disagrees with the idea of a diversity quota system is a bigot. These people striving for change weld a great deal of power now because they overwhelmingly come from upper middle class families. The upper middle class and up are the only people who earn enough to consume a lot of the increasingly expensive products and services being produced by the (global )economy today. Progressives also have the backing of major multinational corporations, like Disney and wealthy philanthropists.
I suggest you do some research before you think you can speak for a majority of people “striving for strange”. They are not underdogs, causes for them are very similar to a religious cause,and vocal number of them do hate white men. You need to go out there and interact with them.
” Most of these so-called left-wing comedians largely appeal to centre-right people and in truth are centrists or even right-leaning, ” LOL. You’re really out of it. The perception of Hollywood being socially liberal was reinforced recently with the plethora of actors and performers speaking out against Trump, and equating all Trump voters with being white supremacists.
It is well known that many entertainers leaned left in the past, but now it is a prerequisite to believe in gay marriage, support transgender bathrooms and support Black Lives Matter (all of blk people’s problems are due to racism) to be in the entertainment industry. Hollywood, journalism, and the social sciences are much more left then they have been in the past. What was considered fringe in 1999 is mainstream now. ESPN has taken a hard left stance since it became acquired by Disney.
http://www.espn.com/espys/2015/story/_/id/13264599/caitlyn-jenner-accepts-arthur-ashe-courage-award-espys-ashe2015
Please don’t try to sell me this myth that Progressives are underdogs. They are winners in today’s society, even if some of them are Starbucks baristas.
“Only a moron would confuse criticism with censorship”
Yet there are many Progressives..Generation Y’s liberals, demanding that any opinion other than theirs is “hate speech”. I suspect you are not up to date with that attitude that many Progressives have towards censorship.Generation Y’s liberals,have towards censorship today. They are very friendly towards it. They do NOT believe in free speech.
Now your comment has changed from being directed at me personally to “all progressives”, tarring everybody with the same brush goes hand in hand with all your other assumptions. This little rant of yours still has no bearing on what you stated before, I’m getting the feeling that you’re the type of person who wants to have the last word, you bend your argument and never take anything back. You’ve read something that offends you on this site and now you want to vent at me, go ahead, you’re arguing about your right-wing ideals and anti-white issues with a far-left person of colour. Save that shit for the correct person who gives a shit.
Your opinion continually wavers; it’s only minorities who want to see other minorities, but minorities do not appeal to the greater public, but minorities are under-represented in film which are then whitewashed, but minorities have a bigger voice than they used to – make your mind up.
One thing about your constant belittling of multiculturalism is that you have to realise diversity doesn’t force itself on you, it’s organic. You take over a country from one race, have years of slavery of another, don’t do jobs for cheap labour, accept immigration to fill gaps in your society, and then all of a sudden you see people of colour and that’s somehow a threat. That’s the essence of prejudice, you keep looking back at times when things favoured you, now they don’t and you want to scapegoat minorities, that’s prejudice in a nutshell, if you can’t see that then you’re out of touch with reality.
People like you who hark back to the good ol’ days are usually annoyed that other demographics now have a slight voice and opinion, but again it’s largely white fake-liberals speaking for people they don’t represent, all of them are then labelled as “progressives” by the right (like that word is a bad thing?) which ruins the issues. Wanting genuine social change is fairness at its essence, if that seems like an attack to your demographic then bad luck, that’s what happens when people of different colours, creeds, sexual preferences, and religions have equality when it comes to free speech. If you’re somehow being oppressed by equality then you’re an idiot.
Now obviously conservatism has many things wrong with it, too many to go into here (I have better shit to do on a Saturday) but you neglect to go into the issues with something you obviously represent, instead you attack the stereotypes and misconceptions of the left (which in reality are centrists with ulterior motives) and moan that the “right has no control any more” which again is equality (if it were truly happening). Society going from right to left (in reality going from right to centre then back to right) is change not a takeover, just because you personally don’t benefit from said change, it doesn’t make it any more or less equal.
And by the way I never said “progressives” were underdogs, because again they are predominantly white middle-classes, the underdogs are the working class, especially working class minorities, and yet you let one speak for the other, and judge the actions of white people (with an agenda) who are allowed to speak for black people without an agenda. Then due to the white liberal progressives’ actions, you start to have a go at the minorities who superficially benefit, maybe take that shit up with Lena Dunham, Rosie O’Donnell, Quentin Tarantino, Seth Rogen, Eddie Izzard, and the rest of those fake-liberal fucks, all of which I criticised (which doesn’t fit into your nice little assumption-fuelled opinion). Just ’cause I also dissed Bill O’Reilly, Donald Trump, Alex Jones, Axl Rose and other right-wing fucks, now you get mad at criticism of your political buddies and your demographic… BUT THAT’S EQUALITY.
Even your namesake the Sabre-toothed Tiger, eventually died out because it couldn’t adapt to change.
Over and out.
Only the right would see diversity in movies as an affront to their race and religion!!!!
” If a Muslim demands a Muslim superhero movie, because that’s what we watch now, with an all Muslim cast, it’s not bigoted.
If a Christian demands that, that Christian is oppressing other people. What sense does that make? ”
…….it makes no sense because th a has never happened…. A white man draws a black brown or yellow superhero but another white man wants another white man to play him. That’s nothing to do with POC. The right drag every issue to Blacks and Muslims smh.
Typical right wing nut job lmfao
The right = We want equality but only for white people 😒
@Saber Tooth Tiger Mike writes “Black Lives Matter (all of blk people’s problems are due to racism)”
No, getting shot or choked to death by the police when you are an unarmed black man isn’t racist at all, sheesh!
You can now add Ghost in the Shell starring Scarlett Johansson to this. Hollywood will keep casting white men/women this until people stop buying tickets.
I feel like someone needs to have courage to fix the entertainment industry entirely.I mean why every black role have to be about gangsters, slavery, and Servitude. I know my history stop beating us in the head with it . What about other history Blacks did more than come to the U.S we had kings and empires as much as any White Europeans had but Hollywood would never get it.I like to make those types of films.If we had more variety like this we wouldn’t be having issues like racial casting and Academy Awards not being.We need more minority Filmmakers and producers stepping up to the plate.And no Tyler Perry is not a good example I like to be like Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese as my heros and I want equally important Movies where you like the stories and characters but not be fallen into a stereotype of films where all we all are just thugs and parodies.I want to see Biblical film where Brothers are the heroes we haven’t got a Elijah, Daniel, Elisha, or Gideon and many more Moses has had it adaptations far too long now.