Representation in Art/Entertainment/Media • Page 42

Chloe Bennet, who stars in TV series Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, has said she had to change her name from Chloe Wang in order to make it in Hollywood.

 

all I can think about is 21
'Flash Boys' Author Says Hollywood Won't Adapt His Book With an Asian Lead

 

Toronto: Benedict Cumberbatch to Star in ‘Gypsy Boy’

 

Yikes

 

Not sure if this is the appropriate place to post this but I thought it was pretty cool. My brother-in-law recently flew to Azraq, Jordan and stayed at a Syrian refugee camp and he, along with some other filmmakers, created a week long Hollywood camp for the kids who are living there. They would get into groups and create short films and at the end of the week they played each film for the entire group and were given awards. It sounds like it was an incredibly rewarding experience for all involved. I wish there was something a little more detailed on it than his Instagram posts but that's all I've got.

EDIT: The media isn't showing up for some reason...hold on

Double Edit: God dammit. Guess his profile is private, which is why it's not showing up. That's lame. Seem's counterintuitive tbh.

 

I only seem not very expressive because my face is always stuck in "so fucking sick of your shit Hollywood" 100% of the time.

 

Reese Witherspoon: 'Run Away From a Man Who Can't Handle Your Ambition. Run.'

 

LOST Alum Daniel Dae Kim Is In Talks To Replace Ed Skrein As Major Ben Daimio In The HELLBOY Reboot

 

Yesssssssssss.

Cast him in everything.

 

a MUCH better turn of events. hope DDK starts gettin paychecks more than what Hawaii 5-0 was willing to give him

 

It's weird how some producers will say there are not popular male Asian actors who could play a lead role when Jackie Chan is headlining a movie this fall and Glenn was one of the most-adored characters in the biggest show on TV. Hiroyuki Sanada could easily headline a film.

It's just another excuse. If the filmmakers were really concerned about Asian actors then they would cast them in supporting roles so that they could gain an audience.

 

That's not even touching the massive Asian film industries. It's easily possible, they just don't want to do it.

 

These movies are made to appeal to the Chinese market half the time, an Asian lead would presumably make a killing in the overseas box office and not have much affect on the US, can't believe no studio has tried it.

 

plus they keep giving people like Armie Hammer and Charlie Hunnam leads in big movies and I love them both but they're not names/movie stars

 

According to the studios, the Chinese market loves white/male American leads and, to be honest, they probably aren't that wrong. The recent Mummy movie, which tanked here, made almost $300 million overseas, which it probably wouldn't have done if Tom Cruise wasn't in the lead. In fact, as long as movies are being made to please the foreign markets, we will continue to see white males dominate the leading role. It's really fucked up, but it comes down to what will bring in the most money overseas, not here.

 

The Chinese market likes white male leads and don't care much for female leads or black actors in general. They also love Transformers, so that says a lot.

It could just be that they like A-list stars with recognizable names and America happens to offer more white males as A-listers.

 

Yeah, that's a good point and definitely a huge factor as well. It's not just the racism in Hollywood we're dealing with here, but the racism in overseas countries as well, which will totally play into our decision making.


So, I mentioned a like a week ago that my brother in law set up this film camp in Jordan. Well, in addition to that they were doing some location scouting for a feature film they're making that centers around Syrian refugees to some degree. Anyways, one of the lead characters is a Syrian woman and, while I don't think I can say who, I can say that of the three actresses that he's in communication with, two are white Americans who could maybe pass as a light skinned Middle Easterner, and the other is French. I asked him if he sees the glaring issue with this, especially since he is of Middle Eastern descent, and asked him why he can't just get a Syrian actress and according to him, they can't make the movie without having A-list actress whose face they can put up on billboards. It's a catch 22 though cause it's like wellll we would have A-list talent from more POC if we would just give them more fuckin roles. I don't know how much of that decision comes down to m brother and how much comes down to the studio but it just made me feel...bleh. Like, I understand this would be doing it for the wrong reasons, but you'd think that at this point studios would at least be making correct casting decisions simply to avoid the inevitable outrage.

 

even in other countries, colorism and anti-blackness is still a pervasive issue

 

And I'm guessing Asians got anti-blackness from the West.

 

Some Asian countries *cough*Japan*cough* are pretty nationalist without any Western influence. Always have been and probably will be for the foreseeable future. They respect whites because they see them as wealthy and powerful while many Japanese people want to be like that.

A lot of Chinese people don't like the West and think of us invaders who push our own moral and political ideals onto countries (probably more of a communist vs the west thing), so I don't know if they got an idea to not like black people from the West or if the West has even had that much of a chance to give them that idea. Star Wars didn't even play in China until a few years ago and they have always had their own cinema going on with their own race as actors/producers.

The more I like about it, the more I think it's just because they haven't seen many black people in movies. Any movies that have had black actors have probably been from the West, so if anything, we have been known to accept black actors in our films.

India's cinema is the same as well.

 

Well, history and racism didn't start with the west. Anti blackness is a problem in many places.