Angelina Jolie's next role...

Cafe Society
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will be as a black woman.

She will portraying Mariane Pearl, the wife the slain reporter Daniel Pearl. She’s of Afro-Cuban-Dutch heritage.

I like Angelina Jolie. She’s a great actress, a fabulous-looking woman, and she seems like a good-hearted person (albeit a little strange). So I have no beef with her taking this role. I think she’ll do a great job.

But I do think that it’s interesting that Jolie was cast to play this role. One message that this sends out is that race is irrelevant to the story being told. I can get behind that. The story is about overcoming grief…a universal struggle. Interjecting race, when it’s not relevant, could serve as a distraction.

Hollywood is full of examples of actors playing characters of different ethnicities, and nationalities. Italians playing Jews, Puerto Ricans playing Mexicans, Americans playing Australians, whites playing everyone non-white. Some of the performances are laughable and derogatory (I can’t watch The Good Earth without wincing), while others are believable and respectable (Jessica Alba in Honey). Then there are characters for whom whiteness is assumed, and yet non-whites are cast. The Rock in “Walking Tall”, and Denzel in many of his roles are examples.

But those are fictional characters. When we are talking about an actor reenacting the life of a real-life individual, just how far should we stray from reality? One can reasonably argue it doesn’t matter whether a blonde portrays a brunette, or a tall man portrays a short man. But what about race? If someone wanted to do a movie about Lance Armstrong, and they cast Will Smith to play him, would the audience accept this as a realistic portrayl? Would ya’ll find it distracting?

Mariane Pearl has stated that she is happy Angelina is playing her (let’s be honest…who wouldn’t be?) But I know a lot of black/biracial actresses feel a teeny bit slighted, and I can’t blame them. Good roles are hard enough to find for white actresses. Imagine how it is for a black actress (I said good roles, Halle Berry! Good roles!) If race is irrelevant to the story, why does the dafault have to be “white”? What would have been the harm in casting Gloria Ruben or Thandie Newton? The latter looks very much like Mariane IMHO. I’m just sayin’…

All that said, I won’t be seeing this movie. Not because of Jolie, but because I can’t stand “ripped from the headline” movies like this.

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“Biggest perceived box office bump” often translates to “white.” I love Thandie Newton, but I suspect she wouldn’t deliver 100th of the viewers Angelina Jolie will – and I guarantee the financing studio doesn’t believe she would.

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Fuckin’ ridiculous.

I have always found Hollywood casting to be astoundingly racist, especially when it comes to females. Halle Berry only made it because she looks white. Lucy Liu is relegated to cliched killer-ninja-chick roles. Jennifer Lopez, Eva Mendes and others look more European than Hispanic.

Even with this, it’s insane to cast Jolie in the role. Maybe next, Jon Voight can play Martin Luther King.

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Hollywood doesn’t seem to understand that they make an awesome movie, it will be a success even if no one has ever heard of the actors. Think of all of the little indie films which became commercial successes just because they were damn good movies.

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Martin Luther King’s race is specifically relevant to his life story. Mariane Pearl’s is not.

Pearl herself has said she’s thrilled Jolie will be playing her.

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But doesn’t this kind of rationale fulfill itself?

Studio doesn’t believe a black actress will attract audiences. So it casts a popular white actress. People flock in droves. Studio decides it made a smart decision and repeats it over and over again. Meanwhile, white actresses, even those with little talent, become stars while black actresses become no-names.

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HA!

There is no correlation between qualilty of the film and the box office success.

NONE!

I say this from over 20 years expierence of working in the industry. I have seen plenty of good films make no money, for instance Gattaca, and films that are total crap make a ton of money, off the top of my head Indepencence Day.
Oh, and I’ve never thought Hallie Berry was white.

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Speaking as a short man & a fan of film, I would argue that height does matter to establishing character. A lot.

Sigh. It… depends. Do you accept Elizabeth Taylor, an Englishwoman, as Cleopatra, a Hellene from ancient Egypt? Why? Because you don’t know any better, I bet. Look, Lance Armstrong is an American. Will Smith is an American. They have similar builds. It could work. That it would be a big deal is a matter of society picking arbitrary categories of physical appearance to be Big Deals. So Will Smith “can’t” play Lance Armstrong, but it’s okay (to pull my personal pet example) for a stringbean like Hugh Jackman to play Wolverine. Hey, if the actor does a good job, fine.

That said: I am significantly distressed to see, in this age of many many “interracial” couples, that Hollywood has decided that since Daniel Pearl was “white,” therefore his wife should also be portrayed as “white.” That’s what offends me. There’s a real shyness about interracial relationships in movies these days, which is really weird to me.

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This is sometimes true, IMO, but think about all the lousy movies that turned a profit because of who starred in them.

An Angelina Jolie provides the producers with a safety net. Even if the movie turns out to be a snoozefest, Jolie’s presence will guarantee a certain amount of box office.

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Again, as noted above, it comes down to who can put viewers in the seats. Jolie can. I consider myself a film fan, but have only heard Newton’s name in passing (not even sure in what context), never saw a photo of her until this thread.

It may not be right, may not be fair, but it is what it is. And it is slowly changing. Halle Berry can put people in the seats (not nearly as many as Jolie, but she can), so there is hope that gradually Hollywood will change. But will we, the viewers?

And I hope I don’t sound racist, but of course it would be distracting to see Smith play Armstrong. Just as distracting as seeing Voight play Dr. King. Who are we kidding?

Sir Rhosis

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I thought her next project was gonna be Atlas Shrugged!

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Huh…

Wait, wait, wait… I thought you said it was a black woman? Apparently she’s playing a light skinned woman of mixed heritage. So your whole premise is lame.

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Probably. I’m not defending the rationale, just putting it out there.

It’s also very possible that the film just wouldn’t be made because of lack of funds if there’s not a big enough name attached. I really have no idea what the motives were in this circumstance – for all I know, Jolie’s production company, if she has one, developed the project specifically for her, in which case, no surprise that she won the role. (And Googling determines that Brad Pitt’s production company is funding the movie, so there you go.)

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This isn’t necessarily what you’re saying, Argent Towers. I’m just playing devil’s advocate here, really. This may also be slightly in reaction to arguments I’ve seen between people that basically boil down to, “I’m blacker than you are because my hair is kinkier/my nose is bigger/etc.” which probably doesn’t have much bearing here. Okay, disclaimers over.

Does the fact that these actresses look more generically European than what we perceive as Hispanic or black diminish their ethnicity? For a silly example, am I any less than German (the majority of my ethnic make-up) because I don’t have blue eyes and blonde hair and wear a dirndl? Part of being Hispanic or black in this country is having some European background.

I’m not denying that there is a bias towards more European looking actresses or that we’re a long ways from Will Smith being able to play Lance Armstrong, but the spectrum of ethnicity includes even those people who don’t fit in. Saying that an actress is successful only because she’s white is very narrow remove from saying she isn’t able to portray convincingly what it’s like to be Hispanic or black (acting talent aside.)

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I once saw Patrick Stewart play Othello.

And the entire rest of the cast was black.

It was a very cool reversal.

Just a tidbit that I thought would fit in the conversation…

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I have no idea whether Angelina Jolie will be good or not- but since Mariane Pearl looks like this:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/terrorism/jan-june02/pearl_3-18.html

Angelina is not necessarily a worse choice physically than any number of African-American actresses.

Does Angelina Jolie have the same skin tone as Mariane Pearl? Absolutely not, but neither does Halle Berry, and I’m willing to bet the OP wouldn’t have been outraged had the part gone to her.

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Agreed. How is Mariane Pearl black? You might as well say Angelina is playing a Dutch woman. What’s wrong with that?

(I could also get off on a rant about Halle Berry proclaiming to be the first black Best Actress when she’s actually bi-racial and every bit as white as she is black, but that’s another thread.)

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I’m black, but I look quite similar to Mariane Pearl. Historically, she would have been cast into slavery just as readily as a dark-skinned black person. She would have been relegated to the back of the bus in Selma, Alabama, and it would have been illegal for her to marry her husband. She has light skin, but she cannot pass as white phenotypically. As has been said too many times to count on this board, “blackness” in the US is defined as having any recent “black” ancestry…only recently have people bothered to question this rule (and usually only when it comes to certain people accepting academy awards). Perhaps in a country like South Africa or Brazil, Pearl would be classified as “colored” or “mulatto”. But in the States, she is a black woman. If she were being described on America’s Most Wanted, you better believe she wouldn’t be called anything other than a “light-skinned black woman”. And that’s not going to change any time soon.

It is possible to have 50% European ancestry (or even more) and still have two black parents, simply due to the crazy way race is defined here.

I’m going to hold my temper, because this isn’t the Pit and it’s a lovely day. But what the hell? Where do I express outrage in the OP, astorian? Didn’t I say MULTIPLE TIMES that I have no problem with Jolie playing this role? Stop reading emotions in the OP that are not there. You only look like a knee-jerking idiot when you do that.

I’d like you to tell me what my premise is, since you’ve obviously judged it so harshly. Because I don’t think I have a premise. I’m just asking some light-hearted questions about a trivial topic. If you can’t join in in a constructive way, please butt out.

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“some light-hearted questions about a trivial topic” Really? Because your tone in the OP and your responses are anything but… Are you perhaps backpedaling?

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What tone? Seriously. Are you such a knee-jerker that you read “outrage” in any frank discussion of race?