When You Aim For The Stars And Really Miss

[alohadave]

Do you know what I hate? Reality TV. It has 'reality' right there in the description, but, girl, reality is decidedly thin on the screen.

They should just call it unscripted drama. There is nothing resembling reality and it's all contrived. They are all playing characters that happen to have the same name as them.

 

[gunhilltrain]

Me too, 100%. I think a better description of it would be "petty TV." I don't understand wanting to watch something like Real Housewives of [wherever]. When I've watched things like that (which isn't often--I almost never sit through episodes of these shows), I feel like I want to take a shower and have my brain reactivated.

Still waiting for "The Real Housewives of Camden, NJ."

 

[Bramblethorn]

AS: Write what you want!
WA: Okay, here's a period drama set in a world where diversity is normalised and celebrated and history isn't whitewashed -
AS: Not like that.

um actually, it's not historically accurate to have women riding dragons, they wouldn't have had the upper body strength

 

[tenyari]

One quick example: Last season of Vikings. The Viking Jarl is a black woman(??!!) and her guards are a company of absolutely kick-ass shield-maidens. The female MC of the show, another shield-maiden, displays fighting abilities that would put to shame Luke Skywalker in his prime. It isn't a fantasy show, set in some different world. They are advocating that they are based on historical events. It is absolutely ridiculous.

I have no idea about that specific example; but it is true that much of what we know about Viking culture comes from an Arab man that traveled up to there and joined a Viking community of his own free will, living among them for a while and then writing his memoirs later.

The somewhat poorly done movies "13th Warrior" is a highly fictionalized version of his story replacing him with... a Spanish actor playing a Moor. Which... sort of works given history.

The thing is: people did travel and live all over the Old World long before the modern era. There are entire communities of people with Chinese ancestry up and down the East coast of Africa. And there was an entire fortress of Free Black African warriors in India that the English spent some time trying to conquer. There have been Black African merchants and nobles all throughout the Mediterranean and if I recall right, a near town-sized community in one city in England in the 11th or 12th century. Linguistic evidence implies the Basque people of Spain have some ancestral connection to the Iroquois. I've met Hawaiians who's ancestry traced to Japan from a century before European contact with the area, and I've met Europeans with Mongolian surnames thanks to Genghis Khan - which means you had Mongolians in Central, Northern, and Eastern Europe in the 12th or 13th century I think.

A friend of mine... from Africa... got his red hair and green eyes because his ancestors captured and enslaved Vikings, bringing them to Africa.

While the movie "The Last Samurai" is complete fiction - there WAS a Black Samurai... but his life ended miserably if I recall right.

I don't give it too much credence, but it's long been suspected that Beethoven or Mozart (I forget which) was mulatto. While it's probably not true for them - it was true for other less famous people in Europe at the time.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Look, just by checking many of my posts you will see me advocating for the rights of women in what is still, regrettably, a man's world. I really do think that. I do believe it inexcusable that after millennia of civilization, we still can't seem to grasp the concept of equality. But I also think that radical Woke is killing the creativity and common sense in today's culture. One quick example: Last season of Vikings. The Viking Jarl is a black woman(??!!) and her guards are a company of absolutely kick-ass shield-maidens. The female MC of the show, another shield-maiden, displays fighting abilities that would put to shame Luke Skywalker in his prime. It isn't a fantasy show, set in some different world. They are advocating that they are based on historical events. It is absolutely ridiculous.

A Black female Viking would certainly not have been common, but by no means impossible:
https://www.history.com/news/dna-proves-viking-women-were-powerful-warriors
https://uwm.edu/anthropology/vikings-in-africa/

Beyond that, all these shows take massive liberties with history in order to create spectacle. Nobody stands on "historical accuracy" when it gets in the way of fun; there's a reason historical shows aren't big on crooked teeth, smallpox scars, or soldiers shitting themselves to death before they ever make it onto the battlefield.

If you can swallow all those other inaccuracies, but suddenly become Very Concerned about Historical Accuracy when it involves black people and women getting a bit more screen time, perhaps ask yourself why.

 

[SimonDoom]

um actually, it's not historically accurate to have women riding dragons, they wouldn't have had the upper body strength

Probably so, and I don't think the dudes would fare much better. I remember the scene in the final season of Game of Thrones where Jon Snow rode a dragon for the first time at Daenerys's invitation, and I recall thinking, This is completely fucking nuts. He'd fall off that critter in 15 seconds, maybe less.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I have no idea about that specific example; but it is true that much of what we know about Viking culture comes from an Arab man that traveled up to there and joined a Viking community of his own free will, living among them for a while and then writing his memoirs later.

The somewhat poorly done movies "13th Warrior" is a highly fictionalized version of his story replacing him with... a Spanish actor.

Not sure what you mean he was replaced with a Spanish actor? Antonio Banderas was playing an Arab in that movie. He was pretty popular in Hollywood back then. Are you saying an Arab should have played that character? I am not sure that was even doable back then, although it would definitely add to the authenticity. But then, all Vikings should only be played by Danes and Norwegians? Russel Crowe had no place playing a Roman general in The Gladiator? Or is it just about the skin tone? It all sounds silly to me. I didn't mention that example in my post because a black female actor was playing a Danish woman Jarl, but because black female actor was playing an African woman Jarl of the Danes. If that makes sense to you, then that is perfectly fine, I am simply saying none of it makes sense to me.
I really don't want to push these things further to be honest. I don't think it is possible to have a civilized discussion about these topics (or many other) without getting snarky comments and people going ad hominem right away.
Anyway, thank you for the polite and constructive reply

 

[tenyari]

um actually, it's not historically accurate to have women riding dragons,

It's not historically accurate to have men riding dragons either.

 

[alohadave]

I've met Hawaiians who's ancestry traced to Japan from a century before European contact with the area

The language spoken on Madagascar is closer to Polynesian and Hawaiian than anything on the African continent.

People got around.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I have no idea about that specific example; but it is true that much of what we know about Viking culture comes from an Arab man that traveled up to there and joined a Viking community of his own free will, living among them for a while and then writing his memoirs later.

The somewhat poorly done movies "13th Warrior" is a highly fictionalized version of his story replacing him with... a Spanish actor playing a Moor. Which... sort of works given history.

The thing is: people did travel and live all over the Old World long before the modern era. There are entire communities of people with Chinese ancestry up and down the East coast of Africa. And there was an entire fortress of Free Black African warriors in India that the English spent some time trying to conquer. There have been Black African merchants and nobles all throughout the Mediterranean and if I recall right, a near town-sized community in one city in England in the 11th or 12th century. Linguistic evidence implies the Basque people of Spain have some ancestral connection to the Iroquois. I've met Hawaiians who's ancestry traced to Japan from a century before European contact with the area, and I've met Europeans with Mongolian surnames thanks to Genghis Khan - which means you had Mongolians in Central, Northern, and Eastern Europe in the 12th or 13th century I think.

A friend of mine... from Africa... got his red hair and green eyes because his ancestors captured and enslaved Vikings, bringing them to Africa.

While the movie "The Last Samurai" is complete fiction - there WAS a Black Samurai... but his life ended miserably if I recall right.

I don't give it too much credence, but it's long been suspected that Beethoven or Mozart (I forget which) was mulatto. While it's probably not true for them - it was true for other less famous people in Europe at the time.

I forget the name of that show where they trace celebrities ancestry, but on the episode with Yo-Yo Ma, they tested his DNA and he had a significant amount of African ancestry, even though his family had always lived in China, going back many centuries.

 

[Bramblethorn]

It's not historically accurate to have men riding dragons either.

Yes, that was rather my point. Possibly I need to start tagging when I'm being snarky.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Not sure what you mean he was replaced with a Spanish actor? Antonio Banderas was playing an Arab in that movie. He was pretty popular in Hollywood back then. Are you saying an Arab should have played that character? I am not sure that was even doable back then, although it would definitely add to the authenticity.

Not sure why it wouldn't have been doable. Arabic people show up on film just fine, and there are plenty of actors around with Arabic ancestry. Tony Shalhoub (Lebanese-American), Salma Hayek (Lebanese/Mexican-American), Jerry Seinfeld (Syrian/Jewish ancestry) were all big names at the time The Thirteenth Warrior was made.

But then, all Vikings should only be played by Danes and Norwegians?

I don't see why; Sweden produced plenty of Vikings too.

Anyway, Caroline Henderson, the actress who plays Jarl Haakon, is Danish/Swedish. She was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother, and grew up in Denmark. If you mean white Danes and Norwegians (and Swedes?) you need to say so.

The reason why casting white actors in non-white roles draws criticism comes down to a combination of several things:

• There's a historical tradition of "blackface"/"yellowface" being done as a racist mockery of non-white people: "minstrel shows" etc. where you'd have a white comedian blacked up in boot polish playing a caricature of a stupid black person.
• Historically and even quite recently, "Hollywood" (using the term figuratively here) has been much more willing to cast white actors in non-white roles than vice versa. John Wayne gets to play Genghis Khan, Christopher Lee played Muhammad Ali Jinna (the founder of Pakistan) and Fu Manchu, Scarlett Johanssen as Kusanagi in Ghost in the Shell, Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One, etc. etc. even before we get into film versions of Jesus over the years.
• Meanwhile, Hollywood was/is far less open to casting non-white actors in historically/canonically white roles. A Mongolian actor playing George Washington or a Pakistani actress playing Queen Elizabeth? Unthinkable.
• Even when a story is set somewhere that has a significant non-white population IRL (like, say, modern-day LA or Sydney), a lot of writers end up writing mostly-white casts, give or take an occasional domestic or ethnic crime gang.

Acting is tough for anybody to break into without connections, but those factors mean it's even harder for non-white actors, and casting white people in non-white roles makes it harder still. If the studios were as happy to cast Black, Asian, Arabic, ... actors in white roles as they are vice versa, it would be much less of an issue.

With "historical" stories, it gets to be a vicious circle. There's plenty of evidence of non-white people all over Europe going back many centuries; a Roman soldier born in Africa could end up stationed in Britain, Vikings brought slaves back home from all over, yada yada. But films and TV shows find it simpler to portray historical Europe as all-white, and people who've never studied history form their ideas about what "historical accuracy" is from the media they watch, and then reject any evidence to the contrary and rant about "wokeness" when a show dares to acknowledge that not everybody was white back then.

 

[onehitwanda]

Yes, that was rather my point. Possibly I need to start tagging when I'm being snarky.

Location: mostly Australia

Dear Snark.

Isn't the snark the default setting? Surely it would be more helpful to tag when you're not?

Love: a fellow snark.

 

[RetroFan]

With his film 'The Deer Hunter' having won the Best Picture Oscar in 1978, up and coming director the late Michael Cimino set out on his next project, a grand epic Western named 'Heavens Gate' with the financial backing of United Artists.

It was meant to be one of the greatest movies of all time, but instead was an almighty mess, savaged by critics and audiences upon its 1980 release as boring, overly long, historically inaccurate and a waste of time and money. It certainly cost a lot of money, good money thrown after bad to create this megaton bomb. The original cut was recalled and scaled down, but still it received poor box office returns and reviews, plus the film received much negative press for the alleged poor treatment of animals on set.

More than 40 years later some people claim the film is brilliant, but the glaring reality is that not a single thing tried to make 'Heaven's Gate' profitable including an attempt to rework the entire movie into a TV mini-series worked and it was a total disaster.

 

[ElectricBlue]

More than 40 years later some people claim the film is brilliant, but the glaring reality is that not a single thing tried to make 'Heaven's Gate' profitable including an attempt to rework the entire movie into a TV mini-series worked and it was a total disaster.

The movie sent United Artists to the wall. A bit of a crap legacy for a "one good movie" director. A good example of hubris, methinks.

 

[SimonDoom]

Not sure why it wouldn't have been doable. Arabic people show up on film just fine, and there are plenty of actors around with Arabic ancestry. Tony Shalhoub (Lebanese-American), Salma Hayek (Lebanese/Mexican-American), Jerry Seinfeld (Syrian/Jewish ancestry) were all big names at the time The Thirteenth Warrior was made.

I love the idea of Jerry Seinfeld playing a Middle Eastern warrior. Just the image of him holding a sword makes me laugh.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Ah, the old race in casting debate rumbles on.

I think I first encountered this when a schoolmate of mine got unusually agitated that Star Trek Voyager cast a black actor as a Vulcan (Tim Russ as Tuvok) back in the 90s. True, in the various previous Star Trek iterations we hadn't seen many (any?) black Vulcan's previously, but even at the age of 16 I was pretty sure this was more due to previous casting choices of the series than any particular cannonical decision about what colour that alien race's skin could be.

Not sure why it wouldn't have been doable. Arabic people show up on film just fine, and there are plenty of actors around with Arabic ancestry....Jerry Seinfeld (Syrian/Jewish ancestry) were all big names at the time The Thirteenth Warrior was made.

(Slap mandolin) So, long boats, eh. What are they all about? Do you ever feel insecure about the length of your boat? Like you're pulling up to the shores of Northumbria to do some raping and pillaging and suddenly you're all like...well, my boat is fairly long, but I swear Olaf's over there is longer. Harold, come here. Is it me, or has Olaf artificially extended the length of his boat? And you know when you drag the local wenches back to your boat she's going to be all like 'damn, I was really expecting a longer boat. I'm not saying this is is a short boat, but it's not a long boat either. Really, it's actually just a boat.' And you're like 'lady, it's not the length of your boat that's important, it's where you sail it. Am I right?' (chicka-chicka-do-do-do-do-doooo-do-bababa-da-da-doo-da)

Sorry, what was I saying?

The thing is, these discussions get so complicated based on what exactly the fictional setting/historical period is and exactly what the artistic goals of the piece are.

At one of end of the spectrum you have the 'race is completely irrelvant to the character and casting' - Doctor Who is an alien who regenerates into a completely new body each time they come near death - there is literally no reason why they can't be any possible race and not really any why they can't swap gender. There's literally nothing to complain about here, but nevertheless, some people will.

But on the other hand, exactly the same thing applies to Ghost in the Shell where Kururagi's body is just a shell, so not tied to any particular race, but again...the other set of people complained.

A slightly lower peg down, there is the 'reimagining/recasting an existing actor or design for a character'. See the live action remake of the Little Mermaid for this. Say aloud 'there are no black Mermaids' and feel how silly that sentence sounds in yoru mouth, but at the same time the original red-headed design of Ariel was fairly iconic, so it's not exactly unreasonable for people to be somewhat upset that Disney go in that direction for the remake without it being necessarily racist. (assuming that you see any point in these modern updates at all, which is another conversation...)

Even further down are the race swaps for characters where it could be argued that race is an essential or at leasts important flavouring part of the character. Personally all the talk of casting a Black James Bond never makes much sense to me as in my mind the character is fundamentally based in 1960's elitist establishment - Eton, Cambridge, MI6. True, as we get further and further away from that time, film-makers keep trying to reinvent the character for the modern age (I wish they wouldn't), so there probably comes a time when arguing about his race makes as much sense as arguing over the race of modern Britain as a whole. (Personally, I'm at the point where the next James Bond can any race/gender you please as long as they look like they're having fun while they're saving the world).

Put another way, if Superman is the ultimate embodiment of the good American, if you cast an African-American do you have to include the African-American experience into his story and if you do, does this change the character (a little or completely)? Comic books have a unique solutions because they can split superhero and everyday identify - so instead of making Peter Parker Latino, they can create a new character who has the Spiderman persona, costume and powers but a completely different cultural heritage (Miles Morales).

At a further level down there is the twin levels of 'racially incongruous (or not if you dig into the history...) actor appearing with or without explanation'. For with explanation, see the Morgan Freeman character in the Kevin Costner Robin Hood film - he's not a character in the original band of Merry Men, but the film goes to great lengths to explain how he's come to join them (there are other issues with that character...) I haven't seen the Viking series under discussion, but I'm guessing it's maybe going something like 'there could be Black Vikings, so there are Black Vikings in our series'.

• Meanwhile, Hollywood was/is far less open to casting non-white actors in historically/canonically white roles. A Mongolian actor playing George Washington or a Pakistani actress playing Queen Elizabeth? Unthinkable.

Not Hollywood but her mother, Anne Boleyn was played by a British-Ghanian actress recently, so we're getting closer.

Which brings us to probably the final peg. The 'suspension of disbelief' level. We know that Anne Boleyn wasn't black. We know that Jodie Turner-Smith is, but then we also know that she's just an actress playing a role for our enjoyment, so why should it matter? For that matter, we knew that (say) Judi Dench wasn't Queen Elizabeth either and it didn't faze us.

You see this in opera a lot, because what matters in opera is the voice and, on stage the actors are 'further away' than they are on television - the conoisseur should be more interested in the singing than how hot the Prima Donna is. Despite this, there are limits. I'm a portly gentleman myself, but I was completely unable to take a production of La Boheme seriously when they cast Pavarotti as the starving artist hero. Similarly, and I'm going to be very ungallant here, I remember a performance of Norma where the title character (who I want to say was Joan Sutherland) started the opera singing about how she was worried that her Roman Legionaire lover was going to leave her for a younger woman and I was like 'yeah, sorry, but I can totally see that happening' only for the other woman to come out and be of a very similar to vintage to the great dame and me deciding that Polionne has a very specific type.

In comparison, someone being the right age, the right body type and the right general appearance, but the wrong race seems like a relatively minor thing. Some people experience serious cogniative dissonnance with this - if you want to chalk this upto a form explicit or innate racism, well, could well be...

(But again, if we agree this is what's happening, then why isn't John Wayne as Genghis Khan is back on the table? Or to cut out the historical issues of whiteness - how do we feel about a black opera singer playing Madame Butterfly, or a Chinese-heritage actor playing Othello?)

• Even when a story is set somewhere that has a significant non-white population IRL (like, say, modern-day LA or Sydney), a lot of writers end up writing mostly-white casts, give or take an occasional domestic or ethnic crime gang.

Yes, this is a fairly uncontraversial area for film to do better in.

(Yay, I've broken the character limit on the post...continued below.)

 

[TheRedChamber]

Acting is tough for anybody to break into without connections, but those factors mean it's even harder for non-white actors, and casting white people in non-white roles makes it harder still. If the studios were as happy to cast Black, Asian, Arabic, ... actors in white roles as they are vice versa, it would be much less of an issue
...But films and TV shows find it simpler to portray historical Europe as all-white, and people who've never studied history form their ideas about what "historical accuracy" is from the media they watch, and then reject any evidence to the contrary and rant about "wokeness" when a show dares to acknowledge that not everybody was white back then.

The thing is, when it comes to 'wokeness', I'd own this. I'd define 'wokeness' in this context as making casting decisions that prioritize non-white actors over white actors because they have traditionally been overlooked. Within this there are tons of casting decisions that cut across race that are not woke - genuinely a case of 'we auditioned a hundred actors and the one we chose absolutely nailed it' but there are also more and more which might boil down to having a number of good choices for this role, and deciding to go with the more diverse one. Eithers fine, but arguable one is more of a political and therefore 'woke' act.

But equally, there are certainly areas of Europe which are or were all-white. I grew up in the Fens in the 80s and up until my 18th birthday knew exactly one black person. I didn't meet anyone muslim or jewish until I went to university. Similarly, if I go to my wife's tiny village in the middle of China, there is no one who looks even slightly like me (whatever Yo-yo Ma's DNA may say to the contrary) There are probably plenty of moments in history where places were actually way more diverse than you might expect and other times where it was probably more or less exactly as you imagine. In my above examples, you could write someone of a different race into the story (after all, I visit my wife's village, so you can write me into your screenplay...) and whatever the percentage likelyhood of someone being there you can always argue that a story is more interesting by focusing on the 1% or the 0.1% or... So the question becomes not so much 'is it completely impossible that this person was here at this moment' so much as it is 'why did the writer decided to include this character in this story right now?' Again, the answer might be that it was a woke bit of writing, but again - so what? But I also don't think its unreasonable to look at a piece of historical drama and wonder to what extent it matches reality (as long as you're not frothing at the mouth when you do it).

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I love the idea of Jerry Seinfeld playing a Middle Eastern warrior. Just the image of him holding a sword makes me laugh.

I just misread that as Jerry Springer...

 

[Emilymcplugger]

My book group is reading "Artemis" by Andt Weir his follow-up to "The Martian." The book is a mess but the biggest irony is how Andy Weir aimed for the stars and shot himself in the foot. He wanted a diverse female character. She's twenty-six, she's Middle Eastern, she's insanely intelligent, and she's also a slacker To make money she agrees to destroy some equipment for a rich guy. The result is that she nearly kills every citizen of Artemis, the lunar city. So Andy Weir's attempt at a diverse character resulted in him creating a Saudi national who launches a terrorist attack that imperils thousands of innocent people! Certainly NOT what he was trying to achieve! What examples can you think of where the author lost the very point of their own novel?

Controversially in films one of the biggest complaints I have is how working people are portrayed by the insanely and ridiculously wealthy.

Take for example, Christopher Nolan’s THE DARK KNIGHT. In that story the Joker plants two LUDICROUSLY LARGE bombs that no-one could miss on two ferries and then tells the inhabitants they have the control to the other bombs. He does this to try and cause both the prisoner boat and the civilian boat to turn against each other.

The civilian boat don’t work out that someone called the Joker is most likely playing a trick on them, and also don’t try and figure out a way to communicate no hostility towards the prisoner ship. Nolan instead plays with the idea that regular people are too thick to think like this.

another film recently where the working class are portrayed as greedy, stupid and immorally self-serving is PARASITE, where one set of working class people simply won’t help another. It’s trying to make a point so hard it strips regular people of humanity in order to make the film work. Yes, they were conning their hosts, but not helping them put them in danger.

The only time I’ve seen this done right is Squid Game, where the people’s hideous money problems meant there was no way they could do anything but play in the games.

But that’s just my beef.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Dear Snark.

Isn't the snark the default setting? Surely it would be more helpful to tag when you're not?

Love: a fellow snark.

...valid.

 

[MelissaBaby]

Controversially in films one of the biggest complaints I have is how working people are portrayed by the insanely and ridiculously wealthy.

Take for example, Christopher Nolan’s THE DARK KNIGHT. In that story the Joker plants two LUDICROUSLY LARGE bombs that no-one could miss on two ferries and then tells the inhabitants they have the control to the other bombs. He does this to try and cause both the prisoner boat and the civilian boat to turn against each other.

The civilian boat don’t work out that someone called the Joker is most likely playing a trick on them, and also don’t try and figure out a way to communicate no hostility towards the prisoner ship. Nolan instead plays with the idea that regular people are too thick to think like this.

another film recently where the working class are portrayed as greedy, stupid and immorally self-serving is PARASITE, where one set of working class people simply won’t help another. It’s trying to make a point so hard it strips regular people of humanity in order to make the film work. Yes, they were conning their hosts, but not helping them put them in danger.

The only time I’ve seen this done right is Squid Game, where the people’s hideous money problems meant there was no way they could do anything but play in the games.

But that’s just my beef.

I was just going to say “How come people in movies never take their shoes off when they get home?”

 

[Bramblethorn]

I love the idea of Jerry Seinfeld playing a Middle Eastern warrior. Just the image of him holding a sword makes me laugh.

Indeed. I wasn't suggesting he specifically should have played that part, just noting that there are quite a few actors of Arabic ancestry around and even in the distant past of 1999 casting them in a film wasn't necessarily box-office poison.

Salma Hayek in the part? That I'd watch.

 

[SimonDoom]

Indeed. I wasn't suggesting he specifically should have played that part, just noting that there are quite a few actors of Arabic ancestry around and even in the distant past of 1999 casting them in a film wasn't necessarily box-office poison.

Salma Hayek in the part? That I'd watch.

You and me both.

 

[AlinaX]

~ Casta Diva che inargenti
~ Queste sacre antiche piante,

(Don't mind me. Sorry - just singing through...)