Luther has been criticised for not being an authentic Black character

[hewontgo]

Luther has been criticised for not being an authentic Black character https://t.co/fVL1cqQDBT
- Yahoo Entertainment UK (@YahooEntsUK) April 14, 2021
Luther's creator has defended the Idris Elba show after the BBC's diversity manager said a lack of Black culture in the character's life meant it doesn't "feel authentic". Writer Neil Cross said Elba

Comments

[musicnkisses]

It be like that for a lot of black people tho. I don’t like the policing of how black people express themselves, especially when the argument is “this black person ain’t black enough!” That said, I understand Luther was written by white ppl. The criticism should then be about how white people struggle with writing authentic black people and not about how he’s not black because he doesn’t do x, y, and z. What are you saying about black people who don’t eat “black” foods or have black friends lmao. Like if that’s something that’s gonna bother you then make sure you’re hiring more black creatives to tell our stories (and inevitably be torn down for not being black enough lmao).

[friarsfire]

This is an excellent comment - glad it was first.

[mabiche11]

Bless you for being the first comment. I came in here hot.

[sandstorm]

I was prepared to be annoyed, but I read the article - You're right. Sometimes our experiences are divorced from our heritage and cultures, especially those of us in the US who moved a lot.

[vibeology_e]

Cross responds : "I have no knowledge or expertise or right to try to tackle in some way the experience of being a Black man in modern Britain. It would have been an act of tremendous arrogance for me to try to write a Black character. We would have ended up with a slightly embarrassed, ignorant, middle-class, White writer's idea of a Black character."

Then hire Black writers! This is not that complicated!

[frelling_tralk]

He didn’t have any other writers at all for Luther I don’t think, he wrote all of the episodes himself

[friarsfire]

This just make me agree with the OC’s comment even more. This idea of being a Michelangelo who does it all themselves is injurious to art. Yes - there are rare people who can do it all (like Michaela Coel, and she’s not perfect) but there’s absolutely nothing wrong and absolutely something right about collaboration. I won’t believe there was no budget for additional writers in show’s entire run.

[frelling_tralk]

Well it’s not really about budget, it’s just much more typical for U.K. shows to have the creator of the show be responsible for writing all of the episodes, you see it with comedy shows as well like Fleabag and The IT Factor

I think that a few like Doctor Who and Merlin started doing it the American way with a showrunner and a writers room with multiple writers and up to 13 episodes a season, but generally it’ll be about 6 episodes a season (or sometimes less than that even, Luthor was down to 3 episodes for its final season!) all written by the show creator.

I agree that he could have definitely brought in other people to collaborate with in this case though if he was so unsure about how to write a black character

[asnindie]

I hope this is an out of context quote because did she really just say he should be eating chicken to make it more "authentic". That isn't the great take you think.

[parachuteending]

Honestly, this same person would've probably said they're stereotyping Luther if he was shown only eating chicken, wearing dashikis at home while enjoying some jazz music.

[friarsfire]

Reading this quote, I’m going to *hope* the person speaking was using “doesn’t eat Caribbean food” as a mundane example of displaying black culture but erred in going too specific. Like, I get the idea that even if you aren’t centering someone’s culture there are elements that will just crop up (e.g., not making a character religious, but have an episode where they’re celebrating a religious holiday in the backdrop).

[rubie_dubidoux]

yeah didn't we just have this discussion about that scene from Ginny & Georgia lol

[evett]

i would say he had no friends. I can't remember him interacting with anyone outside of work related people (colleagues, witnesses and suspects) besides his ex-wife and her husband.

[iznanassi]

This is...a lot.