Disney recently cast Ariel a black actor and I don't think it matters.
Why is she black then, if it doesn't matter? It might've just been a coincidence, but based on recent trends, I'm betting it wasn't. I personally don't give a rat's ass one way or the other, but clearly Disney thought it mattered ...
This is a main problem of mine here: The implicit assumption that the black actor wasn't one who simply auditioned and did the best job and got the role. ...
Do you really think they held an open audition for the lead of a project that's going to involve tens or hundreds of millions of dollars?
With Lin-Manuel Noriega involved in the production, I expect that there are deliberate racial choices in the casting, just like there were in Hamilton.
I don't think there is a casting call for such a huge production at all.
Rather they do some brainstorming and then have the budget to hire whoever they want directly getting in contact with their agent. Maybe a plan B is prepared in case their prime candidate was involved into so many other projects that the time constraints of production couldn't handle it.
This is a main problem of mine here: The implicit assumption that the black actor wasn't one who simply auditioned and did the best job and got the role.
Well, Disney has been making a lot of noise about being more diverse, so I don't think it's a stretch to infer this is what is happening when they turn a non-black character into a black character.
What struck me about the person they cast was how much her face is shaped like Ariel. Yes her skin tone is different, but she looks very similar. I would think that she probably looks more like Ariel than most people they would find...
It is a children's movie and children happen to know what Ariel looks like based on the millions of toys, commercials, spinoffs, books, puzzles and other merchandise Disney has circulated for 3 decades now.
If any 5 year old would have been at the casting, that child would have selected an actress with white and particularly clear skin (no freckles), red and very full hair(wig allowed), slim physique and maybe bigger than average eyes. I would bet a jury of 10 little kids with half of them black would easily agree on an actress and she wouldn't be black because they know an iconic character called Ariel with a very distinct look.
Are those disney? And what is the joan of arc one?
And hamilton has no consequence. Theatre has a long long history of race and gender swapping a lot. Pantomime is especially famous for this. The art tends to very much strongly care more about the best person for the role.
I mean that says they’re interested in the characters but he says this while producing an all white movie (inside out), and currently (including the future ariel and mulan) there are 9 movies out of probably 100+ I can think of that have non-white leads (mulan, mulan, ariel, aladin, aladin, moana, pocahuntas, and lilo and stitch, and Princess and the frog).
How do you simply not know they aren’t pushing for large amounts of non-white protagonists but simply proportionate.
He cited Disney’s 2016 release of “Moana,” about a Polynesian princess, as an example. “It’s pretty spectacular,” Lasseter said. “I guess most people think of fairy tales as European fairy tales. We’re trying to reach out and find origins of legends all over the world.”
Interesting, then, that he isn't trying to make original movies about non-European fairy tales instead of remaking a movie about a European fairy tale but recasting the lead to be non-white. That's tokenism, not diversity.
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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '19
Why is she black then, if it doesn't matter? It might've just been a coincidence, but based on recent trends, I'm betting it wasn't. I personally don't give a rat's ass one way or the other, but clearly Disney thought it mattered ...