Uh…* Boys don’t cry* came out in 2000.
As an aside, am I the only one who’s not even sure off the top of my head what Zoe Saldana’s actual skin color is? Out of the five movies I’ve seen her in, she was green three times, blue once, and brown once, and the brown one was the least memorable of the lot.
Please don’t take this the wrong way…but have you googled her name?
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And Transamerica in 2005.
I could Google Saldana if I felt it important to see what she actually looks like, but I haven’t bothered. That’s why I said “off the top of my head”. And I’m sufficiently aware of pop culture to know that she’s some shade of brown; I just don’t know exactly what shade.
And this should be of interest to us why?
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Being upset about changing skin color (unless someone’s playing an alien or whatever), I can see. Worrying about changing physical features like noses, ears, etc? Unless it’s to make them look more “ethnic” (Like back in the day when you’d have a white actor play an Asian character), I don’t see the big deal. In fact, it’s extremely common.
As I said before, look at everything Gary Oldman went through to play Winston Churchill.
Because the average person in America and even more so overseas, upon hearing the name Zoe Saldana, will probably think first about Marvel movies and either not know or care about some movie where she apparently wasn’t “black enough.”
It’s the same reason I never understood the backlash against the casting in the live action Ghost in the Shell. The source material and the various anime adaptations make it very clear that the body is just a construct built to carry the mind.
I’m not arguing for exact ethnic makeup. I’m arguing for one that doesn’t see widely disparate ethnicities as interchangeable just because they happen to be melanin-enriched.
Condescending snark noted.
If you’re holding Terrence Howard up as any kind of “quality”, I’m going to have to question your judgement…
If a South African would be just as good, you’ve eliminated the “quality” variable and can move on to the “authentic” objection, then. But you’re saying there’s no need to satisfy authenticity, that quality is necessary and sufficient. I disagree, as do many other people.
Because I appreciate budget restrictions - Eastwood is more able to spend an extra few thousand dollars searching for a South African actor that fits the bill than a theatre director ever could. Until they make a Hamiltonesque musical out of the Mandela story, maybe. I admit I’d also give more allowances to small indie films to cast who they can, so I’m sorry I implied it’s the medium.
It is not surprising to me that you don’t get it. You are a white person. You are likely quite unfamilar with colorism in the black community and the stigma that a woman like Nina Simone faced for her physical appearance.
To select a light-skinned woman to portray Nina Simone not just glosses over that struggle, it shits all over. It perpetuated the stupid message that Nina’s very existence belied: that a dark-skinned woman who does not meet the Eurocentic ideal can be still be a star.
White people might not care about stuff like this because to the average white eye, we black folk all look the same and we are all interchangable. But black people are sensitive to this because of life experience. Zoe Saldana was one of the poorest choices that could have been made for that movie, and its low box office earning is a testament to this. Which is a damn shame given how interesting Nina’s story is.
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I, for one, am only going to watch horror movies featuring real murderers, from now on.
And all this tells me is something I already knew. White people think negroes all look the same. We are all “some shade of brown”. The shade doesn’t matter. Black is black.
Reminds of the time I complimented a.black coworker on the deep tan she had acquired from vacation. Her normal cinnamon complexion was two shades darker. White coworker feels compelled to chime in with “She has a tan?” I know people can’t help.what they see and don’t see, but it is frustrating to think that the people around you aren’t really seeing you but rather some generic racial outline of you. I seem to notice all the various shades of hair coloring my white coworkers have. I can differentiate ash blonde from auburn. Why is skin color so elusive?
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Does it matter that Scarjo is an A-List actress who can help build an audience, and there are no trans ‘A’ listers? What if the lack of a star means that the movie won’t be made at all? Is that a good thing for the trans community?
No, I said that most people, if they know the name Zoe Saldana, will only know of three Marvel movies. If you start pressing them, they might come up with the new Star Trek movies. I’m terrible with remembering what actors are in movies and I completely forgot that she played Uhura, and since it’s been several years since Star Trek Beyond came out I doubt I’m the only one. Even more so with the overseas box office. Nina was a limited release movie of an American musician and activist that many people in both the US and worldwide have never heard of. It doesn’t make Nina Simone unimportant or not worthy of a biopic, but it does make her unimportant to them. So, when there’s some debate over how appropriate the casting is, a resounding “Who cares?” is to be expected.
And hearing "who cares? from a bunch of white people is nothing new. You guys don’t care because y’all don’t have to. Your indifference has nothing to do with how well- or poorly-known Zoe Saldana is. White people in general just don’t care about the subtleties of skin color and how they might relate to a character’s story. It is just another thing ya’ll can shrug your shoulders over. I totally get it. It isn’t that hard to get.
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I’d argue that roughly 7+ billion people likely neither know nor care that Zoe Saldana was in a biopic and that there was a controversy over the casting. That’s a heck of a lot more than just white people.
Yeah, 'cause when you take that bus, you get there.
I don’t know how relevant this is, but from a very young age I was scolded by my mother if I made any reference to shades of brown, if I mentioned that a black person I knew looked tan, if I expressed any envy of their ability to stand outside in sunlight more than 15 minutes without burning, basically, if I paid attention to any variation in the color of “black people”.
Mother was the one I remember most, but I recall some other instances of white folks shushing other white folks for, basically, noticing these things.
None of which makes anything I’m talking about right, I’m just saying, there maybe be a cultural factor at work of which you are unaware. Not just indifference, but actively discouraging children from noting variations in skin color. I’m sure it contributes to the effect you noted.
Oddly enough, I’ve never had a black person scold me for saying a particular person is very dark-skinned, or relatively light skinned for their ethnicity. Maybe I’m just clued in to doing it in a respectful manner, purely as a way of describing someone. I like to think I am, I certainly try to be.
I wasn’t talking about skin color. I know what you mean about skin color. That is indeed messed up. (I’ve read comments from people who assume that black people don’t need sunscreen, or don’t get skin cancer. WTF?) Again, re-read my original post, because I said just that.
But I was mostly talking about is actors and actresses wearing facial prosthetics. That happens on every movie set, regardless of the race of the character. You have to age someone, give them a bigger forehead, make them bald, a huge birthmark, a scar, make them fatter, a hump, etc.
And I’d argue this is completely irrelevant. People who haven’t heard about the situation at all aren’t going to say “who cares?” They’re going to not say anything. In order to say “who cares?” about a situation, you must first be made aware of the situation. You can’t dismiss as unimportant what you don’t know about.
And monstro is absolutely right that the predominant group of people dismissing it as unimportant are white people. Black people, on the other hand, seem to very much understand why casting Saldona would be an issue.
I admit I didn’t get it at first, but then I fought my own ignorance instead of saying “who cares?” I knew some people cared, so I looked it up online to find out why. Turns out, the woman’s very dark skin was very important to her story. Also, as I was vaguely aware, light skinned black people face less discrimination than darker skinned ones. As such, Zoe Saldona darkening her skin to play the part is like a lesser version of a white person doing so.
I think looking it up (or asking for more info in person) is the bare minimum that a person should do before deciding whether something is worth caring about. As such, I agree with monstro that those who hear about it but don’t care to inform themselves don’t matter, nor do those who have not heard about the situation at all.
Those whose opinions matter are those who experience the discrimination, and those who have informed themselves about this discrimination. It is irrelevant that 7 billion+ people don’t know about the situation, same as it’s irrelevant that 7 billion+ people don’t know how quantum mechanics works at a deep level.