Wow, a real-life encounter with the comparatively rare “anti-whoosh”, where I assumed another poster was joking but they really meant it! 
Assume that for some reason, 100 years from now, China will have a non-negligible number of white people living there (e.g. 8-10% of China). And someone makes a period drama about the Qin dynasty. In order to be inclusive to the white folks living in China at that time, do you think it makes sense to cast white people as various royals in the Qin dynasty court? Or cast the Qin emperor as a white person?
Does it make sense for Chinese productions to cast Han Chinese to represent Genghis Khan and the Mongols? Because that already happens.
And if your answer is yes, maybe question what that says about your views on race.
“Makes sense” in terms of documentary-level historical realism? Of course not, that would be ridiculously counterfactual.
“Makes sense” in terms of accomplishing the filmmakers’ vision for this fictional period drama? Sure, it’s their show, they can do what they want. As Great_Antibob notes, Chinese period dramas already use some historically inaccurate racial casting, why would it be different 100 years from now?
I think it depends. If a film is cast specifically to obscure racial inequities, or so white actors will appeal to a wider audience even if the role would accurately be played by a person of color, that would be wrong.
But if actors are selected ignoring race because “who cares?,” then it’s fine by me. Cohen’s MacBeth included multiple people of color playing 16th century Scotsmen and was excellent, and the casting was not distracting at all. Same goes for hobbits and mermaids being played by POC.
Deconstructing racism means deconstructing race, whenever the possibility presents itself. There’s no reason aside from racism in society and culture that, say, a short German actor portraying a tall British character is considered more acceptable than a tall African American actor portraying a tall British character. I think it’s a good thing when these kinds of conscious efforts are made to fight against these many, many remaining artifacts white supremacism.
There’s no question that many such objections are based on racism—thinking of Black people and White people are fundamentally different, non-interchangeable kinds of people.
But I’m suspicious of absolutes like “no reason aside from racism.” Maybe a non-racist might have trouble suspending disbelief if characters who were supposed to be close relatives were portrayed by actors who looked nothing alike (including but not limited to cases where they’re obviously different races)?
You’d think the sarcasm was enough to indicate sarcasm, but we’re stuck in this modern degenerate time… 
I think even that possibility is driven by racism, even if it’s unintentional. Our system and society teach us that black people and white people look fundamentally different. Even if they’re the same height, same build, and with similar facial features, our system tells us that skin color differences are more significant. I don’t think this is some natural fact of human perception - it’s fed by the baseline racism in society.
It’s 100% racist bullshit. A lot of institutions like orchestras use blind auditions, but this can get difficult when it comes to things like dancing and acting.
If anyone is interested in this subject in general I can’t recommend this channel enough,
My apologies. Like I said, I missed the /s and I didn’t really know what it meant anyway. And while in person I could hear the inflection of your voice and read your body language, I had a harder time recognizing the written cues you provided.
Or correcting a previously whitewashed narrative of the past.
See, for example, The Lone Ranger…
This sounds very much like what Western dramas (made in Europe or the US) did in making movies about China and other Asian lands back in the 1960s.
as one example among a very great many, have a look at the cast of Genghis Khan (1965)
The difference is that the actors were often trying to look Chinese with prosthetics or affectations of speech and the like. (Stephen Boyd was particularly noticeable at this). In the situation being described now, no one would be trying to look like a stereotyped Chinese individual (which is insulting), but would play it straight.
I guess that’s my question: would y’all be fine with
- Omar Sharif as Genghis Khan
- Stephen Boyd as Jamuga
- James Mason as Kam Ling
- Eli Wallach as Shah of Khwarezm
- Françoise Dorléac as Bortei
- Telly Savalas as Shan’
playing straight, instead of using Asian actors?
From the comments in this thread, it looks like people are saying the race & look of the actor has no bearing on what role they can play.
Personally, the above actors playing their roles as is is far less preferable than Asian actors playing those roles.
I was constructing an analogous situation. I think, in today’s world, no one would propose casting an all-Caucasian Chinese drama, because, even if they didn’t put on fake accents, foam rubber epicanthic folds, and the like, they would still be seen as usurping jobs from actors of Asian ancestry. If you try to use a Caucasian actor in the role of a black character, you WILL hear about it.
But I have to admit that, having watched the Dev Patel David Copperfield, bits of Bridgerton, and similar recent mixed-race casts, IK can easily watch actors of backgrounds that don’t match those of the characters. Heck, small and community theaters have been doing that for ages.
Just to tie these three posts together with a nice little bow, I want to come back to Saint-Georges. Before his military career he was a virtuoso violinist and composer, nicknamed the “Black Mozart” (I mean, Mozart was a better composer but then Mozart was a better composer than virtually everyone at the time). He was appointed Director of the Paris Opera but lost the job because the leading sopranos refused to work with him (because race). In fact, despite his incredible skills and successes he unfortunately still ran into a lot of racist bullshit throughout his life.
But there are two relevant things about him you might be interested in knowing:
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Saint-Georges was known as the best duelist in France for pretty much his whole life. Nobody could touch him with a sword in a one-on-one match.
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Saint-Georges was the direct military commander of the aforementioned Thomas Dumas.
Which does rather lead to some interesting thoughts on the inspiration for D’Artagnan…
I’d love to see a film about Saint-Georges, but to really do it justice it’d have to be a French film. Hollywood would ruin it.