Robert Downey Jr. Goes Blackface
I guess this is the moral and ethical progress white people are talking about that us black people have a hard time spotting.
How far we’ve progressed. Whites can now perform in blackface and black people are ridiculed BEFORE protesting for even thinking about having the gall to do so. Even pre-emptively we have comments about Al Sharpton commenting on the blackface.
The fact that this movie is supposed to be about the egos of Hollywood actors adds a thick layer of unintended racial irony on top of the obvious offense of blackface performance. It is this: Robert Downey Jr., a white man who, like many super rich entertainers has suffered from drug addiction and has been convicted of drug crimes. He represents the double-standard of Hollywood and this society as no non-white actor could have the resume of drug crime that he has and remain an A-list actor who gets major funding from the big moviehouses. Whites will deny this, as racial double standards are routinely denied by reactionary whites but deep down, they know its true. A black actor would be out of work indefinitely if caught multiple times by police with heroin, cocaine, marijuana and other illegal drugs as Downey Jr. has been. This social fact adds a sick and very twisted arrogant irony that this actor specifically, one that would be out of work if he were not white to begin with, is tapped to paint his face black and play a black man on the silver screen. Talk about ego. White arrogance, contextualized, seems boundless.
As a preemptive side note to all of those who comment that this won’t be offensive, who decides on this kind of question? Whites or blacks?
This issue dates back a century. The legacy of haranguing men like Al Sharpton dates back to before Al Sharpton was born. Whites have always decided what was acceptable or offensive. That is why they essentially hate a person like Al Sharpton who represents non-whites deciding for themselves what is or is not appropriate. On another side not, it should also be taken into consideration that Downey Jr. has another majorly funded movie coming out this year. So what? This says that he wasn’t tapped for this role on some downswing of this career but that this blackface move is something he is riding on the upswing of his career, a move he deems beneficial as gravy on top of the multimillion dollar Iron Man role he is already bagged for 2008 release. Just something to consider if anyone is thinking this represents some valley in his career to explain the choice. On the contrary, blackface is apparently the kind of choice made by white Hollywood actors at their peaks.
March 13, 2008 at 9:10 pm
Awful post. Not as awful as watching white chicks though. Whiteface!
March 14, 2008 at 3:59 pm
The spirit of George Wallace blogs forth! Thanks!
March 15, 2008 at 8:19 pm
I know it hurts that I cut down your entire post with a few words, but there is no need for name calling.
March 17, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Hehe…you offered nothing for me to think about, mi amigo. Empty retorts from strangers are okay. I can handle it.
Have anything of substance to contribute?
March 27, 2008 at 4:22 pm
I haven’t seen the trailers to this movie as of yet. However, the stories surrounding the news regarding Robert Downey Jr performing as a black man sound funny. Far as satire goes, that is.
We won’t know until it comes out, but it sure got my attention. A good thing, I think–nowadays.
–The Wow Jones Report
March 27, 2008 at 4:32 pm
CHMT,
Ooops. I meant to write that the news regarding the photo of Robert Downey Jr playing a black actor suggest that the movie is funny. Hey, I chuckled when I saw the photo.
–The Wow Jones Report
May 25, 2008 at 7:33 am
[...] specifically sought out 3) I find it hard to believe NO black people were offended when so many people online have questioned this movie [...]
May 26, 2008 at 7:29 am
Of course folks are offended. In a society that places property rights above everything, human rights included, we would have to stick together to impose our moral values on a culture without any. And we, don’t stick together much. Jena was good but we still have not regained the collective consciousness we had 40 years ago when most of the leadership was executed.
Only collective pressure will bring these endless supremacist indignities to an end.
May 28, 2008 at 5:04 pm
I’m convinced that people who are complaining about this movie have no idea what it’s about. No one complained when the Wayans brothers went undercover as white women in “White Chicks”. Why didn’t they hire two white actors to play the part? For that matter, why didn’t they hire two white actresses to play the part? Did anyone complain about male actors losing out on a role when Julie Andrews did “Victor Victoria”? And where were the feminist groups when Dustin Hoffman kept a female actor from working when he took on the role of Dorothy Michaels in “Tootsie”? The point I’m trying to make is that if any of these roles were played by the people they were impersonating the plots of these movies would have been very different or would have made no sense at all.
“Tropic Thunder” (or at least Robert Downey’s character), is based on the same premise as the movies and characters mentioned above. Robert Downey Jr. plays Kirk Lazurus. He is a white Australian, award winning actor who is know for going to extremes for his roles. So much so that he goes through a medical procedure to make his skin black so that he can play the role of Osiris who is black. It is a bone of contention with fellow actor Alpa Chino (Brandon T. Jackson) who IS black, that Kirk, a white actor, is playing the role of a black man. It’s also mentioned that at some point in his career Kirk Lazurus also played the role of Gloria Steinem.
Robert Downey Jr. is NOT taking a role from a black actor. Kirk Lazurus, the character in the movie within the movie, IS. Personally, (and I guess I have to qualify this by saying I’m black) I think this is a clever idea. Wish I had written it.
May 29, 2008 at 3:22 am
If you think that the primary problem folks have with this blackface is that we are down one less job, you have missed the point entirely and should read more/rethink things.
As for your wish that you had come up with this idea for blackface, I don’t really know what to say to that. It strikes me as pityable but you probably don’t care because thinking this is about the loss of a single acting job, you don’t understand what is going on here.