• grue@lemmy.world
    37·
    9 hours ago

    I’m not sure who needs to hear this, but there were black people in ancient Greece IRL. It’s not even “woke,” just historically accurate!

    • betanumerus@lemmy.caEnglish
      6·
      6 hours ago

      It isn’t an issue any more than whether Odysseus had a hairy back or not or what colour hair he had. This entire topic is a nothing burger.

    • lobut@lemmy.ca
      7·
      8 hours ago

      I hate the word “woke” in general after it deviated from it’s intended cause (not by the ones that coined it of course).

      However the right wing is very smart is disguising certain things that they pretend to champion and mask it as if they’re doing people a favour. A big part of “woke” (even though they can’t put it into words) is corporate pandering. Which I don’t think the left cares for too much… but that can be stretched to mean anything to be fair. The thing is that some people can THINK they mean: shoving representation to only sell tickets but it can also fit under as hating minorities because they’re taking over. It all fits into the same umbrella.

      In any case, black people were in ancient Greece just as there were black cowboys. World was more diverse than some think.

  • betanumerus@lemmy.caEnglish
    7·
    6 hours ago

    Those who make a fuss about about skin tone will never be happy. The binary world they imagine is not the real one. Nolan’s choice was brilliant.

    I do imagine Athena being more mature than Zendaya though, but we’ll see. I’ve never actually seen her act.

  • Zephyr@sh.itjust.works
    4·
    6 hours ago

    I feel like I hear this argument about casting from every side. If it’s done one way it’s woke and another way it’s white washing. Like 95% of the time I couldn’t care less. 5% of the time the casting is extremely distracting from the story which is what I care about. Like hypothetically if someone cast Hitler as an African, Indian, or Chinese person in an otherwise period correct film it would be super distracting. Similarly if someone cast like a white dude as Bruce Lee’s character in like a remake of Enter the Dragon and like Kareem Abdul-Jabbars characters like with Peter Dinklage I would have a really tough time paying attention to the film like the original.

    Casting most of the time isn’t too sensitive for myself, but there are certain conditions where the casting kinda has to be a particular way for the story to work. Like if you have a film. That’s supposed to be set in Bejing and everyone is Italian with a thick Italian accent it’s just not happening for me.

    • DarkSirrush@piefed.caEnglish
      3·
      6 hours ago

      Fully grown, in a dastardly tan suit, which he used to hypnotise the masses into thinking he was an american born citizen.

      But lo! The denizens of Facebook and 4chan have a totally legitimate copy of his Kenyan broth birth certificate, if only the sheeple would just listen to them!

  • 𝙈𝙞𝙖@quokk.auEnglish
    13·
    13 hours ago

    What’s next, Cat Woman giving a black woman the role of Helen of Troy in an Elizabethan tragedy?

    • aGlassDarkly@piefed.zipEnglish
      9·
      9 hours ago

      It’s a myth. No one who matters cares what color the actor’s skin is as long as they do good work portraying the character.

      • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.mlEnglish
        4·
        6 hours ago

        Tell that to Ursula Le Guin when she saw all those white people in the Earthsea adaptations.

        Note: There are few characters in the Earthsea books who are white precisely because most fantasy is white.

        • aGlassDarkly@piefed.zipEnglish
          1·
          6 hours ago

          If you can’t tell the difference between random white people on the internet complaining about a film adaptation of the Odyssey and the author of Earthsea not liking the TV show they made about her books just because they’re both fictional narratives, you might be a bit out of your depth in attempting to critique Le Guin about anything.

              • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.mlEnglish
                2·
                2 hours ago

                That’s partly on me. To be clear, I wanted to point out there are cases where it’s a valid complaint, outside of the usual white genocide dipshits. The current “controversy” with Helen is not one of those cases

      • usualsuspect191@lemmy.ca
        6·
        8 hours ago

        I might care if the character has a well-defined appearance in the source material and it’s important to their character. That’s not the case for The Odyssey of course, but there’s a steelman version of the argument that has some merit.

      • Viceversa@lemmy.world
        3·
        7 hours ago

        It’s a myth.

        It’s a myth of ancient Greece.

        In my opinion the appearance of an actor may be irrelevant for the theatrical piece, but for cinema miscast will damage the overall image.

        • aGlassDarkly@piefed.zipEnglish
          2·
          7 hours ago

          Bullshit. It’s a modern take on an ancient myth where half the characters are barely described physically. Nothing about people who never existed can be miscast by skin color, unless you’re going to try to tell me that this is meant to be a historical reenactment of, again, events that never happened.

          I suppose Charybdis could be miscast if they used a kangaroo, but frankly I haven’t seen the movie and don’t know if that part is even depicted.

          • Viceversa@lemmy.world
            2·
            7 hours ago

            Nothing about people who never existed can be miscast by skin color

            You’re ready to throw ethnological context out of the window?
            It seems pretty important to the myth representation.

            • aGlassDarkly@piefed.zipEnglish
              1·
              7 hours ago

              If seeing a black person in a movie ruins the “myth representation” for you, maybe just skip going to see it. No one’s going to drag you to a theatre and strap you into a chair.

              • Viceversa@lemmy.world
                3·
                6 hours ago

                It would be strange to me to see a Caucasian person in a film adaptation of a myth of ancient China or of an African tribe as well.

                • aGlassDarkly@piefed.zipEnglish
                  1·
                  6 hours ago

                  Maybe skip those too, then ¯_(ツ)_/¯

                  There isn’t a shortage of movies. I’m willing to bet someone is out there pandering to your preference for historically accurate skin tone in fictional stories where it’s barely described and has no meaning in relation to the plot.

  • Lobster@lemmy.ml
    2·
    11 hours ago

    To state the obvious, it’s not a worker doing that. It’s Universal Studios.

    • arrow74@lemmy.zip
      1·
      7 hours ago

      Is the director not a worker?

      Universal profits from the movies and shows written by people.

      Some of these actors and directors do eventually amass a lot of wealth, but there’s a surprising number of even known actors/directors that are not that wealthy.

      There are even more unknown actors in particular living in an apartment with 12 roommates in LA.

      It’s kinda how the system works. Have thousands of lower tier actors trying to make it big and uplift a few to show it’s possible. Then they can cast “no-name” actors and extras for an unlivible wage because you have to do this type of work for the chance to make it