Dear Hollywood Whitewashers: Ridley Scott

Sunday’s episode of Last Week Tonight did a magnificent piece on whitewashing in Hollywood (more on that in this week’s News Satire Roundup,) which got me thinking.  I’ve been paying more attention to diversity in film and television lately, and I’ve mentioned being no fan of whitewashing.  However, a quote from Ridley Scott, director of 2014's white-led Egyptian story Exodus:  Gods and Kings, made me realize something I haven’t talked about – the excuses that filmmakers (and actors) give when the public calls them out on whitewashing practices.  So, this is a new feature focused specifically on these kinds of excuses and my replies on them.  (Note:  as with many of the films I’ll eventually bring up in this feature, I haven’t seen Exodus:  Gods and Kings, but I’m commenting on the casting trend and not the movies themselves.)

Here’s Ridley Scott on why he cast white men (Christian Bale and Joel Edgerton) as leads in his movie about Egyptian characters:  “I can’t mount a film of this budget, where I have to rely on tax rebates in Spain, and say that my lead actor is Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such.  I’m just not going to get it financed. So the question doesn’t even come up.”

We won’t focus too much on the “the tax rebates made me do it!” hand-wringing over budget, except to point out that that excuse wouldn’t have remotely flown for a story set virtually anywhere else in Africa.  Even though Hollywood has (mostly!) learned that it can’t get away with casting white actors as Black people, Middle Eastern characters are subjected to whitewashing more often, particularly in biblical epics like Exodus.

See, here’s the thing, Ridley Scott.  Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such (topnotch phrasing there, really well-made choice) has ludicrously-limited opportunities in Hollywood.  Goodness knows he’s unlikely to be cast in any race-non-specified role that will probably default to white.   The casting calls his agent sends him are a lot of Arab Cab Driver, Terrorist #3, and Oil Sheik stuff.  He goes to these auditions and he takes these parts because he wants to work and he wants to act and he looks for something more substantial to come along.

But when those parts do come along, people like you say, “Who’s this guy?  I can’t open a movie with someone like him,” and they cast a white “name” (or not – Bale is a star, but Edgerton isn’t much of a known commodity, as the Last Week Tonight piece points out) in the name of selling tickets.  Well, no, that’s not quite right.  As you said, “the question doesn’t even come up.”  You never see his audition, because he doesn’t get to give you one, because you’re already decided that’s not an option worth considering.

And if he never gets that chance to even try for a part like that, he’s always going to be “Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such,” because he can’t make a name for himself off of Terrorist #3.  Do you know who Robert De Niro, Brad Pitt, and, yes, Christian Bale, all were once?  Robert and Brad and Christian so-and-so from such-and-such.  Years ago, they became the names we know today for two important reasons.  First, they’re damn good actors.  Second, they were able to prove that to Hollywood – and the rest of us – because they were able to audition for and get great roles in great movies.  By denying Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such the opportunity to show you what he can do, you’re just perpetuating the trumped-up excuse you used to exclude him in the first place.