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[.GqueB.]

I still think it's wrong. If the director wants to separate between beautiful light-skinned women and ugly black girls to make a point in his movie then the agency does so during casting and sends everyone else home, not publicly announce something like this. They could have called for "African American women who can dance, any physical shape, 18-30" and then put the light rich-looking ones in the roles they want and the others as the poor ones. Can you tell me what information is lost in a more tactful not overtly racist casting call?

Why waste people's time? People would pay to print out their headshots, gas. Some would have to take a shift off from work. All because some casting company wanted to be nice.

I've been part of a casing call for a photoshoot. We asked for very specific ages and races. If I got there and saw them bringing in a bunch of people that clearly didn't fit the description provided then I'd be pissed. One you're wasting my money and two you're wasting my time.

They're wording was terrible and could've been done better but this is just reality.

 

[knkng]

It could help a lot if you posted this Django casting calls that you are so surely think are also problematic. And again saying that this is set on the world of NWA so this denigration is okay is silly, you are suggesting that a contracted agency not related to the studio needed to do their casting call in character consistent with the movie, where they channeling Dre or Yela? And again, the studio itself, being the true visionaries behind the movie, repudiated this, why arent they instead using the same response?

I still think it's wrong. If the director wants to separate between beautiful light-skinned women and ugly black girls to make a point in his movie then the agency does so during casting and sends everyone else home, not publicly announce something like this. They could have called for "African American women who can dance, any physical shape, 18-30" and then put the light rich-looking ones in the roles they want and the others as the poor ones. Can you tell me what information is lost in a more tactful not overtly racist casting call?

You guys make fair points, and they certainly could have made a more blanket casting call and then narrowed it down privately, but they might have been trying to avoid an issue where 300 models show up, and they have only 5 or 6 "ugly" girls show up (sorry, didn't know how else to word that). I understand that the language used may have been too harsh, and of course they apologized after the backlash, but let's be real here. These girls are most likely going to be reflected from D -> A as we progress through the careers of the members of NWA. Also, this must have been communicated to the casting agency by the studio, even though they are now denying it. How else do you think the agency came up with this information?

Chances are this movie is not going to be politically correct, and we are already seeing this in casting. The fact that it has become a public issue does not change the casting requirement for this movie. If you have an issue here, it's with the script or overall content of the film. Until you can prove that the casting is racist based on the requirements of the script, there is really nothing else to discuss here.

In bad taste? Perhaps. Racist? I would say not.

 

[dream]

There's a comment on the original article that makes a great point:

This is not racist at all. And I'm a Black man who was born and raised in Compton who works in Hollywood. You're making a movie about a very specific point in time where people looked a very specific way, how is that racist? That's the spectrum of what people look like who live in Compton, an inner city predominately Black and hispanic environment. Are all the casting calls for the tons of period pieces Hollywood loves to churn out featuring the palest of white men and women that cast zero Black people and want the whitest blue eyed people they can find racist? No, because that's what the period looked like. So getting casting "right" on what can be deemed a more current "period piece" about the pioneers of gangster rap in 1980s Compton is far from racist.

NWA is so specific to and definitive of a certain time and place (can you imagine "She Swallowed It" being released today?) that it's best to think of this as a period piece with a very specific aesthetic.

 

[Tim the Wiz]

So, Hollywood casting agents help craft the perception that beautiful light-skinned girls and ugly dark-skinned girls are the norm, and ugly light-skinned girls and beautiful dark-skinned girls are the anomaly.

It's almost like our conditioning is conditioned.

 

[shuri]

I'm lost.

So I guess people would rather have the casting agency go and do a super generic casting call for black women of all sorts of shapes and sizes and looks and have interns do the sorting in secret at the end of the day?

You guys also do realise that the requirements were given by the producers, the director and etc? It's true that the wordings make it looks like: "light skinned women > dark skinned women" but.. It's the requirements for the settings of the movie.

The group A-B ladies will be probably be used for clubs, modeling, photoshoot covers, etc.. While the C and D women (regular, everyday women) will be used for street scenes, daily life settings. etc. And even there i bet scenes will involve ladies from all groups together.

 

[Steve Youngblood]

I'm lost.

So I guess people would rather have the casting agency go and do a super generic casting call for black women of all sorts of shapes and sizes and looks and have interns do the sorting in secret at the end of the day?

I guess I have two thoughts. Firstly, does the casting even require this level of specificity? Is a good-looking-but-not-quite-model-level dark skinned woman going to throw everything off? Is a poor, unattractive, out-of-shape, lighter-skinned woman going to completely ruin the historical accuracy of the film? Even if we answer in the affirmative, the second point is would the casting session for these extras be tumultuous if the wrong people did show up? "Why is my time being wasted with these ugly light-skinned women!? We specifically asked for only ugly dark-skinned women!"

 

[MikeDown]

Small waists, nice hips. You should be light-skinned. Beyonce is a prototype here.

 

[Earthstrike]

Let me take a stab at this:

Hello, We are currently looking to recruit females for an upcoming feature film that meets any of these requirement sets:

- Attractive Models of any race. Must have real Hair. Age 18-30.

- Attractive light skinned females. Age 18-30.

- African American girls, medium to light skinned with a weave. Age 18-30.

- African American girls. Not in good shape. Medium to dark skin tone. Character types. Age 18-30.

If you meet any of these descriptions and are interested in a role in this upcoming film, please email a current color photo, your name, Union status, height/weight, age, city in which you live and phone number to: SandeAlessiCasting@gmail.com

Ta-da. I said the exact same thing but without any kind of ranking system that denigrates people and/or races while still preserving the nature of the recruiting process to find suitable candidates.

 

[enzo_gt]

Let me take a stab at this:

Ta-da. I said the exact same thing but without any kind of ranking system that denigrates people and/or races while still preserving the nature of the recruiting process to find suitable candidates.

Actually, you simply removed your own preconceived ranking system, replaced it with an implied one, and did not change the discrepancy in attractiveness. This is no different in intent or application than what is found in OP.

 

[Scrooged]

Is this kind of casing call out of the ordinary when trying to get actors for a specific era/location?

On first glance this may seem to be insensitive, but...the point of casting is to narrow down an actor based on how they look. I see this as the nature of the business instead of any kind of racism.

 

[PhoenixDark]

There's nothing wrong with casting ugly or unattractive people in films. The problem I have is that the casting suggests that only darker black women are being considered for the "ugly" women. Go to any city and tell me what you see. You will not see one type of black women, you'll see a collection - some attractive, many overweight, some homely, some cute...and color wise they'll be quite varied. You're not just going to see dark chicks in Compton or Detroit.

I have no problem with casting looking for attractive women, in fact I think the tier A sounds perfectly fair; it basically says if you're attractive come through and audition. But everything else is ridiculous. A "B tier" girl has to be light skinned? What sense does that make...especially when we're talking about 1980s LA when the obsession over "light v dark" wasn't nearly as ridiculous as it is now.

 

[royalan]

There's nothing wrong with casting ugly or unattractive people in films. The problem I have is that the casting suggests that only darker black women are being considered for the "ugly" women. Go to any city and tell me what you see. You will not see one type of black women, you'll see a collection - some attractive, many overweight, some homely, some cute...and color wise they'll be quite varied. You're not just going to see dark chicks in Compton or Detroit.

I have no problem with casting looking for attractive women, in fact I think the tier A sounds perfectly fair; it basically says if you're attractive come through and audition. But everything else is ridiculous. A "B tier" girl has to be light skinned? What sense does that make...especially when we're talking about 1980s LA when the obsession over "light v dark" wasn't nearly as ridiculous as it is now.

Your entire post is on point, but the bolded is something I hadn't realized, and you're right. The dark-skinned black girl wasn't considered so "less than" back in the 80s/early-90s. Especially in urban culture.

 

[Camp Lo]

This movie just went from "meh..." to MUST SEE!

 

[Bodacious]

This movie just went from "meh..." to MUST SEE!

Seriously. It's gonna have the hottest of the hottest.

 

[Earthstrike]

Actually, you simply removed your own preconceived ranking system, replaced it with an implied one, and did not change the discrepancy in attractiveness. This is no different in intent or application than what is found in OP.

Well, knowing that they need to cast women that are specifically both unattractive and african american, how would you achieve this then? Or are you claiming that a movie must recruit any kind of women for a role which demands an unattractive female?

 

[Mesousa]

Look at the average hip hop video and you see the light woman pushed above else.

It only starts to hurt people when its spelled out to them. I peaked the game as a kid and stopped watching Hiphop music videos.

 

[Maebe]

I don't understand how any sane person could look at what's in the OP, which is basically a modern day caste system, and come to any other conclusion that the shit's racist as fuck and morally repugnant.

Yep.

 

[Bucket Mouse]

Ta-da. I said the exact same thing but without any kind of ranking system that denigrates people and/or races while still preserving the nature of the recruiting process to find suitable candidates.

Can you not see that the original casting call and your modified version are both racist because they explicitly link attractiveness with skin tone and colour? It doesn't matter if you remove the A-D ranking system and some of the more informal language if the underlying message is still that lighter girls are the most attractive.

Something like the below would be preferable even if it's not ideal; it retains the bluntness required of a casting call with less insidious racial implications. It's still as lookist and weightist as you'd expect a typical Hollywood casting call which sorts people by their appearance to be, but no one is bashing it for these things in this particular instance- they're bashing it because it is loaded with racist language.

Hello, we are currently looking to recruit females for an upcoming feature film that meets any of these requirement sets:

GROUP A: African American females of average attractiveness. Age 18-30.

GROUP B: Very attractive models of any race. Age 18-30. These are the hottest of the hottest. MUST have real hair - no extensions, very classy looking, great bodies. You can be black, white, asian, hispanic, mid eastern, or mixed race too.

GROUP C: African American females of below average attractiveness. Not in good shape. Age 18-30. 

GROUP D: Attractive African American females / African American females of above average attractiveness. Age 18-30. These are fine girls, long natural hair, really nice bodies. Small waists, nice hips.

If you meet any of these descriptions and are interested in a role in this upcoming film, please email a current color photo, your name, Union status, height/weight, age, city in which you live and phone number to:SandeAlessiCasting@gmail.com

 

[lednerg]

Has anybody seen the script? It's possible that these descriptions were taken from it.

 

[Winterfang]

"poor not in shape african american" I don't know if people are going to apply for this

If the money is good why not?, they are probably going to just be extras in the background anyway.

 

[chronos4590]

Utterly disgusting god damn

 

[Prototype Viktor]

Makes me wonder about Michael Bay's casting calls...

A) IQ must be under 80

B) IQ must be under 100

C) Shorts must be no longer then 4 inches long

D) Must have robot friends

 

[Trike]

I don't see how this casting call is racist at all. The 'A' tier girls includes 'black', which is of course African American. The C and D girls would be reflective of Compton itself. How is this racist? I don't see it at all.

I studied Performing Arts, and it's true that some casting calls are racist as fuck, but this is definitely not one of them. It's just a movie with a lot of poor black people in it.

They seem to be using the casting of ABCD girls as a scale, with "A" as attractive and "D" as unattractive. This also goes hand in hand with skin tone, with the last two only being for African American women.

Compton being made up of only unattractive and/or poor, out of shape African American women is not reflective of all of Compton either.

 

[The Faceless Master]

There's nothing wrong with casting ugly or unattractive people in films. The problem I have is that the casting suggests that only darker black women are being considered for the "ugly" women. Go to any city and tell me what you see. You will not see one type of black women, you'll see a collection - some attractive, many overweight, some homely, some cute...and color wise they'll be quite varied. You're not just going to see dark chicks in Compton or Detroit.

I have no problem with casting looking for attractive women, in fact I think the tier A sounds perfectly fair; it basically says if you're attractive come through and audition. But everything else is ridiculous. A "B tier" girl has to be light skinned? What sense does that make...especially when we're talking about 1980s LA when the obsession over "light v dark" wasn't nearly as ridiculous as it is now.

i

do

NOT

UNDERSTAND




WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY




some people

don't get this

 

[Deleted member 30609]

the colour tone section is particularly offensive.