If you know me, you’ll probably be surprised that I am not taking the opportunity of this being Labor Day to write something about the Labor Movement through history or the need for an increased minimum wage or the reinstatement of unemployment insurance in North Carolina. Fear not, I am still subjecting my kids to the annual retelling of the Pinkertons at the McCormick plant and the Haymarket Square Affair. I’m even adding a video to our forced Labor Day history lesson this year – a piece about unfair labor practices at Goodwill, which explains one of the many reasons we won’t shop there despite our support of reuse, recycling and repurposing.

Watch it here

Okay, so I guess I did take the opportunity to write something about Labor Day.

The actual subject of this post, however, is diversity in Hollywood. It’s a topic that’s been knocking around in my head for a while and just came to the forefront again when I recently watched Guardians of the Galaxy. While I have a lot of thoughts on the subject of diversity in general and diversity in media and entertainment in particular, what I really want to post is a question. Not a rhetorical one, a tell me what you think one.

I’ll preface by saying that diversity is important. I know some of you think it is not, or agree in principle but think it’s not an issue anymore, or think it’s just some lefty pinko plot to subvert meritocracy at the expense of us white folks. We’ll just have to agree to disagree. But I should note that the reason we disagree is because you’re wrong.

As a brief illustration, allow me to ask how you enjoyed the last Tyler Perry movie you watched. No? Medea’s Witness Protection didn’t interest you? Well, maybe you don’t go for his silly comedies. How’d you like Good Deeds? or For Colored Girls? Still no? Is it because his movies are targeted largely at a race and culture other than your own? Is it because it would feel weird to pay your 20 bucks for cinema tickets and movie snacks, then look up at the big screen and see no one who looks like you? An entire cast of folks who were not white? What the hell?

Well, that’s my point. Most films, at least the big budget Hollywoody ones, are primarily populated by white people. Even the characters that the underlying story or book explicitly states is a person of color are usually portrayed by white actors. I’m not saying there are no people of color in the movies. I mean, we need actors to play the criminals and the service industry, right? And the occasional badass (I’m looking at you, Samuel L. Jackson). Okay, a wee bit of hyperbole there, but by and large, you have to admit the principal characters with most of the lines are white. Also, usually male, but that’s a different post.

Now, I’m not judging you. I haven’t seen any of these Tyler Perry films either. The Medea movies look too silly for my taste and, honestly, I never heard about the other ones I listed. I had to look them up. One of them even has Idris Elba (who I love) in it! Even if I had known about them, though, I don’t know if I’d have gone to a theater to watch. Being uncomfortably honest, I’d rather view a mixed-race cast or a white cast than a homogenous cast of not me. I guess I just assume I wouldn’t connect to it.

Imagine if virtually every movie available was a homogenous cast of not you. How much would that suck on date night? And what if you wanted to be an actor for a living? How few jobs would there be for you? Would you be willing to take jobs that cast you as an uncomplimentary stereotype just so you could get work? Those are the realities for people of color.

Incidentally, while I was looking for movie titles, I learned something else: Forbes Magazine says that Tyler Perry is the highest paid man in entertainment. He makes more than Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp, neither of whom even make the top 10, and also more than men like Steven Spielberg and Dr. Phil. Who knew? There’s a lucrative market of moviegoers who want to see black folks in principal roles in entertainment.

here

Note to self: figure out why Dr. Phil, who is not even a licensed psychologist, makes $80 million a year.

Not only is it natural for people to want to see people who look like them represented on the big and little screen (as something other than gangstas), it’s important. When we are young, we tend only to be able to imagine ourselves as adults in the same roles we have seen adults who look like us. We may, therefore, think we could grow up to have whatever kind of career our parents have. If you’re a white kid, you can additionally pretty much imagine yourself in any job because you’ve seen that modeled on TV and in the movies.

If you’re a person of color, what you see modeled is very different. That’s why it was such a big deal when Gene Roddenberry cast Nichelle Nichols as communications officer Lt. Uhura on Star Trek. For the first time, a black woman was a primary character on a major TV series in a role that wasn’t a maid or nanny, but an astronaut officer who was an important member of the bridge crew of a spaceship. Suddenly, a generation of young black kids were able to picture themselves in respected roles of responsibility like Uhura.

Finally to my question…

I saw Guardians of the Galaxy recently and I quite liked it. It was fun. Afterward, I started thinking about Zoe Saldana (who, coincidentally, also plays Uhura in the Star Trek reboot movies). Saldana self-identifies as a black woman. In some circles, this causes a stir because she could also be considered Latina, with parents hailing from Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Either way, she is a person of color. In Guardians, though, that color is green.

Likewise, Dave Bautista, who plays one of the other 2 humanoid main characters, is the child of Filipino and Greek parents. In Guardians, his skin is red. Well, gray-green with a red overlay.

So does Guardians of the Galaxy get ‘credit’ for diversity in its casting when the makeup and effects used on the non-white actors obscure their race and ethnicity to an unrecognizable degree? Certainly the filmmakers hired a diverse cast, so in the actors-getting-work department they get high marks. But no one is going to look at Gamora or Drax and think “that person looks like me.” It would kind of be like if gingers were underrepresented in film. Sure they hired Karen Gillan, a redhead, to play Nebula in the movie, but Nebula is bald (and blue).

There you go. That’s my question. Do you consider a film to be racially or ethnically diverse if the actors’ ethnicity and race are hidden?

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Cover photo credit: Groot by Alice. Licensed through Creative Commons. See original here.