LATEST MOAN FROM YOU AND ME - 2021

Happy new year to you all.
So this morning I've opened my TV times to see 'Anne Boleyn' a drama on channel 5 'coming soon'
Well it won't be coming to me, because the part is played by a black actress..(Jodie Turner Smith)
Lovely looking woman, but it grates on me.
If a drama was written about Martin Luther King played by a white man, there would be riots.
I don't believe it..
What the hell is going on!
Why not make films as historically accurate as possible?
When the public choose fantasy they can tune into game of thrones etc.
In the excellent 'Dickensian' series we had a black artful dodger,.. just daft.
I'm not a racist, i like Nadia Hussain, and my favourite news reader is Clive on the BBC, but there is a trend now to push square pegs into round holes to make a statement.
Bit like having Rock music to the costume drama Vanity fair.. It ruined it.
Rant over!

 

Doesn't it depend on whether the purveyors of the art, theatre or film want to portray historical accuracy? In which case, I agree with JR. It smacks of political correctness in a world gone mad.
When it's a portrayal of a fantasy then yes, it's open to interpretation. I've lost count of the number of times a film-of-a-book has been a crushing disappointment because the characters in the film don't (and can't) resemble what my own imagination conjured up

 

Agree. If actors were chosen purely by how closely they resemble the actual person and not by how well they can play what the person was actually like, the theatre and movie world would be rather dull.

But I do agree that nowadays there is a lot of blackwashing and greenwashing and any colour washing going around. "Good Housekeeping" had a large Dr Oteker baking stuff ad and the middle aged lady spraying edible gold spray on her cake was obviously photoshopped to have vaguely darker, perhaps Asian features and colouring. That's silly, but hopefully just teething troubles. I think we are starting to get better at this, slowly.

Yes, we do need to see more diversity in the mainstream visual input every day just to get used to seeing what our world is really like, instead of focusing on an outdated "ideal". It's especially important for the minorities who have grown up not seeing anyone looking like them to be mainstream, or usual, but being there just because they represent a minority.

Art is a step aside, please do keep hiring the best actors for the job and not the best lookalikes. Shakespeare did ok with his all male cast

 

So Tom Cruise can play Nelson Mandela?
Don't you think that would be a tad disrespectful..?!
(I'd pick Idris Elba by the way)
Why not go the whole hog and have a black male playing Ann Boleyn.. And there you have it, a pantomime!

 

This world is surely getting muddled with nonsense. If I wore a feather in my hat, sticking straight up, the First nation here would accuse me of cultural appropriation. If I wore an outfit with multi coloured bright colours and a gele to match, again, the same thing, just a different finger pointing at me. I always considered mimicking someone and not in a mocking manner, a compliment. Don't know why that type of thinking has been tossed out.

Since we're thinking along those lines, how about casting Venus Williams as Toulouse Lautrec?

Or me in the role of Mohammed Ali? -the sting might be there but that's about all

 

It's sensible to select the best actor for the role, but my own taste is for realism above all.
For fable or fiction I'd give thumbs up for all diversity but when a historic event is produced i personally like to have some accuracy.
Braveheart for example was enjoyable but not necessarily historically correct.
If they had cast Will Smith as Braveheart and Richard Prior as Longshanks I'd have lost interest early on.. (actually Prior would have improved the humour no doubt)
Yet i like those guys in other Hollywood roles.
The way it's going we could well see a lot more diversity.. Canadian Lori playing Muhammad Ali?
Depends on the opposition lol
I'd volunteer, and I'm sure you'd beat me (Mrs Ewing makes short work of it).

 

Venus is tall enough to pass for the role! ..not sure about her acting skills. How about Beyoncé playing Toulouse Lautrec.. She's a bit tall and a bit hot, but hey who cares, it's all about art lol.

 

My family are an international mixture so I have no bias for or against any race. I also love British history and agree with JR, I just couldn't watch a programme or film with the wrong coloured person playing a role. History shouldn't be re-written, I would find it distasteful and a lack of respect for those in our past.

Taking it a step further could anyone imagine Henry VIII marrying any other than a white person? All his wives were white.

 

Well @JR even the DIY shows are very guilty of bending the believable. They've got people sewing a set of drapes during a commercial break or fitting kitchen cabinets in minutes and the plumbing magically adjusts it's placement to accomodate the new location of the basins.

I saw one where you could almost feel how uneven the floor tile was just by brief glimpses down the room.

 

Now you're splitting hairs Shiney but I take your point.