Color-Blind Casting

Today I'd like to talk a little bit about color-blind casting in both Broadway plays and Hollywood movies. This is an issue for both nonwhite actors and those who study and percieve racial inequalities in the United States (I'm going to stick to just the US, because there are other racial issues when moving to other countries). To begin to address this issue, the root starts at the scripts for movies and plays. This chart shows the breakdown of casting calls between June 1-August 31, 2006 for roles (not extras or stunt people):

Not only do the vast majority of specified roles go to white people, but almost half of all of the roles are unspecified roles that by default go to white people.

It's pretty easy to see the inequality here, but let's play a little devil's advocate and move to the other side of the issue. There are movies and plays that REQUIRE specific genders to increase the plot's meaning. Take a play/movie like Hairspray, for example. The plot hinges upon there being black and white characters. If Penny and Seaweed weren't a black man and white woman, would the song "Without Love" make any sense at all?

Let's look at some recent examples of mixed-race casting. One movie that recently came under fire was M. Night Shyamalan's The Last Airbender. This movie is based on the children's show Avatar: The Last Airbender, an animated show in which all of the main characters were Asian.

But in the live action movie version, most of the actors playing these characters were white. 

Shyamalan's response? He actually WAS practicing color blind casting: he chose which actors he thought best for the main roles, regardless of their race. He claimed that the anime style of the original series left the race of the main characters open for interpretation, and he took the artistic interpretation he was allowed as director. 

And sometimes, white actors are chosen to play non-white characters. Angelina Jolie, who usually looks like this:

Played Marlane Pearl, a French reporter with Afro-Cuban and Dutch heritage in the film A Mighty Heart. Jolie's skin and hair were darkened for the role, so that she more resembled Pearl.

But Jolie was selected by Pearl herself, believing that Jolie would provide the most integrity to the role.

So my question to you, readers, is:
Should color-blind casting always be practiced? Sometimes? Never? When is it appropriate?
Feel free to leave your thoughts on color-blind casting vs traditional, race-specified casting in the comments.

As always, thanks for reading!!
Meghana

Transforming Yourself: Stage Makeup for Romeo and Juliet

This week I'd like to focus a little less on the academic side of this blog and a little more on the pure aesthetic side of the blog. This last week I had the amazing experience of doing the makeup for my school's production of Romeo and Juliet. For anyone reading this blog that does not go to my school, let me just add that our school affords us a lot of amazing experiences, and our theatre program is both well funded and very high quality.

For the next three weeks, I'd like to focus on the transformative aspect of aesthetics: how easy it is to transform your appearance and how that affects you. That is one of the things that I can take away from my experience with Romeo and Juliet: many of the cast members expressed how theatre can be an escape for them, that they become a complete other person and don't have to focus on themselves for a while. And my job is to make sure that they complete that transformation not only on the inside but on the outside so that the audience believes it.

Working behind the scenes on a play is amazingly enjoyable for me. It's hard to explain to the actors, whose greatest ambition is to be on the stage under a spotlight, but it is much more fulfilling to me to be the one waiting offstage with powder for when they sweat (ew, I know) or blush for when they get a little too washed out. In fact, as I found out last year, I really hate being on stage.

Being able to contribute to the success of a play like Romeo and Juliet, and to watch my friends and peers become fantastic actors was an absolutely rewarding and wonderful experience for me. And helping a 17 year old look like he's 50, well, that's both awesome and hilarious.

It's interesting to me how looking like another person can so wholly transform you. You can't completely become that other person until you walk in their shoes. One perfect example is my friend Megan, who played Lady Capulet. We gave her really sharp lines on her face and dark makeup, which only intensified her sternness as a character. She looked absolutely awesome and you could often catch her staring at herself in the mirror and scowling, because looking like Lady Capulet helped her become Lady Capulet.

In the next two posts, I want to explore other ways that people transform their outer shells to transform themselves on the inside, if only for one night.

Until next time,
Meghana