I’m watching the 1st episode of “Kids In The Hall” from 1989, and there’s a character “Mississippi Gary”, a black blues guy played by one of the white guys in black makeup. I also recall Billy Crystal on SNL repeatedly doing his imitation of Sammy Davis Jr, in black makeup, in the mid 80’s.
To my knowledge, these bits weren’t considered offensive, but I certainly could have missed any outrage (since it was before we had the SDMB and the BBQ Pit for discussing recreational outrage).
I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t fly today. Did something specific happen, or was it just gradual changing of sensibilities?
Robert Downey, Jr. played a black guy in Tropic Thunder, and it didn’t raise much of a stir. I think it’s mostly just a problem when it’s done for satire, not when it’s a realistic depiction.
Ted Danson got all sorts of (justified) criticism when he performed in blackface for an awards show (even though he asked Whoopi Goldberg if it was OK). But that was minstrel show blackface, which is completely anethema.
OTOH, Fred Armisen, a white guy, has been portraying Barak Obama for several years on SNL with barely a peep from anyone.
If you’re doing it for comic effect, then it’s probably OK, as long as you stay away from the offensive stereotypes like minstrel shows. For a dramatic role, it’d probably raise some hackles.
There’s a difference between a white actor portraying a black character, and blackface. Darrell Hammond as Jesse Jackson is making fun of a specific celebrity. Al Jolson in blackface is making fun of black people.
Also, Robert Downey Jr.'s character in Tropic Thunder was white. He was just pretending to be black for the movie his character was starring in.
While I’m at it, Ted Danson’s blackface routine wasn’t at an award show, it was at a roast.
Thre’s a difference between minstrelsy and a studied impersonation of a specific black person or character; I didn’t see Tropic Thunder, but I gather Robert Downey Jr.'s character didn’t act shiftless, gobble watermelon or make sucking sounds at passing white women. It’s a question of intent.
BTW, Fred Armisen is of Hispanic origin, so it’s not like some blonde preppie is cooning it up in blackface as Obama.
When did blackface become unacceptable? Hard to say. It was still a semi-respectable Hollywood trope as recently as the early 70s, or whenever Richard Burton last played Othello. Michelle Shocked once did an album substantially consisting of minstrel-type music, just to remind us all where we came from, culturally. It was her best album to date.
Downey in Tropic Thunder was actually playing a white character who himself was an actor playing a black character. It was a satirization of Hollywood egos and actors’ stunts to win Oscars.
I had forgotten all about this, but I remember how he apparently thought because he was “getting at” Whoopi, he somehow had a pass on the minstrel show action…:dubious:
An irony of that is the guys were of Indian and Pakistani descent.
It wasn’t uncommon for black performers- especially light skinned ones- to don blackface even as late as the 1920s. I’ve seen Bing Crosby in blackface in 1930s movies, but that’s evidently about when the backlash began because you rarely see it after that except in movies like The Al Jolson Story (in scenes set in the 1920s). Archie Bunker was wearing blackface in the episode of All in the Family where his grandson was born and by then it was a major taboo.
So I’d say it was on its way out by World War II and the Civil Rights movement killed it off as acceptable entertainment. This is in the U.S. only; other countries without the minstrel show baggage still have elements of it such as Zwarte Piet (Black Peter) in Spain and the Low Countries and St. Nicholas’s Six to Eight Black Men.
He did it in Holiday Inn (1942) celebrating Lincoln’s Birthday and IIRC the act included stereotyped pickaninnies too. That scene is often cut when the movie is shown today.
Oh My Frigging Damn- wasn’t aware of that. I’ve only seen the cut version. I’m more offended by Louise Beavers (the large black lady) singing about Lincoln settin’ the darkies free than I am by the white she-pickaninny; at least the white actors probably weren’t embarrassed.
To act lazy, or to lack ambition. To be dishonest. To be unwilling or unable to hold a respectable job. This was a commonly held stereotype of black people that went hand-in-hand with the fondness of watermelon and the other stereotypes bigoted people held.
