Hunger Games Director talks Casting

[dkwrkm]

Lionsgate has confirmed that Jennifer Lawrence has been cast as Katniss and Entertainment Weekly interviewed director Gary Ross. For once, they asked some relevant questions:

There’s already quite a bit of hand-wringing that, no matter how good an actress Lawrence is, at 20 she’s simply too old for the role.First of all I talked to Suzanne

Comments

[llamrei]

I'm relieved about Rue and Thresh.

[tryxkittie]

I'm not.

He's fine with Rue and Thresh being black because they die and are never replaced with other prominent black characters. Thresh himself is a noble savage archetype if I've ever seen one (which means I'm not exactly putting the author of the books on a throne of authority when it comes to race representations). Them being black in the movie is a small victory, but not much of one.

Not to mention the director seems awfully dismissive of the racial issues in casting a blonde haired blue eyed white as white actress in a role that could have gone to a different type of actress - a darker skinned actress - in order to promote darker skinned actresses in major roles, which is sorely needed in Hollywood.

[calcifermagnet]

Something that really stands out to me in this issue is the constant blonde-bashing. Like blondes are some kind of symbol of whiteness. But then, she's not blone. I lost my link to a picture of her younger with her natural hair color, but here is one with her roots clearly showing:

http://www.imdb.com/media/rm1225308672/nm2225369

Like 4/5 of all blondes, she's a bottle blonde. That doesn't suddenly make her casting ok, but that's how the director is taking it, because there are so many comments from the fandom about her blondness being the issue.

[stigmatize]

blonde-bashing

are you for real rn

[tryxkittie]

ikr?

[calcifermagnet]

I believe that snark and wank to not add to real racial discrimination discourse. They have their place, certainly, but not when a subject is being discussed seriously.

But being blonde isn't some white-only-club thing. Hmong, Berber, Sami, and Inuits are some POC ethnic groups with blonde hair. Mixed race children can have blond hair. These people all deserve representation too.

[stigmatize]

Caucasian, blonde, tan girls are pretty much an undeniable symbol of whiteness, which Lawrence exemplifies. we're not talking about a blonde person of another race; if we were, the complaints of whitewashing would be defunct. mostly your comment reads like OH NO SOMEONE THINK OF THE POOR BLOND PPL!! like it's. really something that gets seriously discriminated against.

[calcifermagnet]

She's not blonde.

[stigmatize]

Her hair is blonde.

[calcifermagnet]

Ok - you can stop trolling now and re-read my comment fully.

[stigmatize]

'Bottle blondes' are not removed from the blonde squad just because they aren't ~natural~. Appearance is what matters here; it's what this entire discussion is about. Just because someone disagrees with your opinion doesn't mean they're trolling.

[calcifermagnet]

I wrote a huge long post, but I don't think anyone would read it. So I'll give you the tl;dr and only post the rest if someone is interested.

Jennifer Lawrence falls under the "exotic beauty" standard that old Hollywood execs are patting themselves on the back on and proclaiming how forward thinking they are.

Typical, idealized white beauty has been called "Classic Beauty". Hollywood has exchanged the "Classical" beauty ideal for the "Exotic" Beauty ideal. This increases the ability for mixed race actresses, like Hailee Steinfeld, to get parts. However, it's still casting people based on a certain standard of beauty and limiting others who don't fall into that standard.

[stigmatize]

how is this relevant to anything

'Exotic Beauty' does not equal brown haired white girls. Exotic Beauty is used to describe hot brown girls who usually cast in parts of ~mysterious sassy foreigner~ love interests. Halle Berry is exotic beauty. Selma Hayek is exotic beauty. Jessica Alba is exotic beauty. Exotic beauty is not white.

Jennifer Lawrence is a white girl from West Virginia. And also? WHY DOES IT MATTER? Whether or not she's in whatever Hollywood beauty quadrant, how does this affect the debate over her being cast as a character fans see as bi-racial? She's an Exotic Beauty, a sort of aesthetic almost always associated with bi-racial women, so it's more okay that she got cast for this part? I honestly have no idea what you're going on about.

[calcifermagnet]

Anyways - the reason I'm mentioning this is because, in order to explain to these guys why we think what they are doing is wrong, you first have to understand what they think they are doing, and what they think the fandom is saying. When you understand how they are thinking (oh look how forward we are by casting non-traditional beauty!) then it can be picked apart.

[stigmatize]

okay what the hell you keep bringing different things into it

EXOTIC BEAUTY =! NON-TRADITIONAL BEAUTY. 'non-traditional beauty' is for the quirky indie girls like ellen paige or kat dennings. also, the 'look' of the actress is not mentioned anywhere in the article. as of right now, it's not relevant. i don't know why you've hooked on to the argument like it's somehow being thrown around willy-nilly by everyone.

[calcifermagnet]

If you don't want to hear more, then please stop responding and requesting more information, thank you.