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Colorism In The Heights

Messofanego

Messofanego

Member
Oct 25, 2017
26,427
UK
'In the Heights' and the Erasure of Dark-Skinned Afro-Latinx Folks (theroot.com)



For a film depicting the Washington Heights, there's an erasure of darker skinned black-latinx folks. Or they're only relegated to background dancers. There appears to be only one darker skinned lead.

The director Jon M Chu (Crazy Rich Asians, which also had erasure of darker skinned Asians) and actors' responses go on with believing in the myth of meritocracy. Jon asks the interviewer Felice Leon if she noticed the darker skinned characters as background dancers. Felice's response was perfect, saying she's used to seeing darker skinned folks in the background but the issue here is they're not in the lead roles. Felice also asks about the light skin privilege. The actors say they saw darker skinned folks in auditions but then says they picked the best actors, which is quite dismissive.

Important to note Felice Leon was denied an interview with Lin Manuel Miranda.

Also, the casting directors are white.
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Hope this conversation spurs improvement from Jon M Chu, Lin Manuel Miranda, and for casting directors to be more representative in order to better represent the stories.
 
WillyFive

WillyFive

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
6,989
The background dancers are specifically the same ones from the original Broadway ensemble. Both Nina and Sonny are darker skinned in the movie vs the original Broadway too.
 
entremet

entremet

You wouldn't toast a NES cartridge
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Oct 26, 2017
60,732
Yep. As a someone of Dominican descent its very jarring. Have these people every been to Washington Heights?

But Colorism is also engrained in Latin culture as well sadly.

I also know this is standard Hollywood nonsense too.
 
LilWayneSuckz

LilWayneSuckz

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,822
The fact that Lin Manuel wouldn't even entertain an interview with Felice has me side-eying the fuck outta him...
 
lenovox1

lenovox1

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Oct 26, 2017
8,995
entremet said:
Yep. As a someone of Dominican descent its very jarring. Have these people every been to Washington Heights?
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The entire cast are Latinos from New York. The creator is a man of Puerto Rican descent from Washington Heights.

This is an important discussion to have, but no one was conscious of the skin tones of the actors in the film. Maybe they should have been.

LilWayneSuckz said:
The fact that Lin Manuel wouldn't even entertain an interview with Felice has me side-eying the fuck outta him...
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Why? His work doesn't consciously bring up colorism, and it's probably not a discussion he's prepared to have about this piece.
 
entremet

entremet

You wouldn't toast a NES cartridge
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Oct 26, 2017
60,732
lenovox1 said:
The entire cast are Latinos from New York. The creator is a man of Puerto Rican descent from Washington Heights.

This is an important discussion to have, but no one was conscious of the skin tones of the actors in the film. Maybe they should have been.
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Oh I'm aware of the background. I know of the original production. But I'm not surprised that lighter skinned Latinos are more prominent.
 
LilWayneSuckz

LilWayneSuckz

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Oct 25, 2017
2,822
lenovox1 said:
Why? His work doesn't consciously bring up colorism, and it's probably not a discussion he's prepared to have about this piece.
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It doesn't have to consciously bring up colorism. It flat out looks bad, like you are running away from even having a discussion about the problem the interviewer has with the movie. And the interviewer isn't being malicious or asking the question in bad faith.
 

IneptEMP

Member
Jan 14, 2019
1,965
I don't know much about the movie but knowing that this is set in NYC the lack of dark-skinned people was pretty evident to me every time I saw a commercial. Will be reading this article.
 
King Kingo

King Kingo

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Dec 3, 2019
7,656
That's very disappointing, colourism should not be an issue in a movie celebrating people of colour yet here we are.
 
Yams

Yams

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Oct 25, 2017
10,902
Yeah they should have cast more Afro-Latinos because that's who lives in those areas but none of those actors are white passing
 
RussTC3

RussTC3

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Nov 28, 2018
1,878
Hopefully this doesn't derail the thread, but where did Latinx come from? I've never ever heard that anywhere in real life.
 
TarpitCarnivore

TarpitCarnivore

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Oct 25, 2017
20,250
Hollywood Duo

Hollywood Duo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
42,458
A significant portion of the cast is from the original Broadway production. That is a big part of the issue itself. Broadway 10 years ago wasn't exactly overflowing with Afro Latino leads.
 
masud

masud

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Oct 31, 2017
731
I grew up right on the border of Harlem and Washington heights and the spectrum of people in the film looked like what you'd see in the heights to me, and two of the leads were black (is Benny supposed to be Afro Latino?). I'm on board with the push for inclusivity but I don't think this is the film to go after.
 
R0b1n

R0b1n

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Jun 29, 2018
7,787
Atraveller said:
Not really. The rich and powerful in Singapore are ethnic Chinese. I don't understand the sentiment of entertaining "more dark-skinned billionaires."
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There are some very rich and powerful minorities too (like the director of DBS) but yeah there's more rich and powerful chinese around
 
RyougaSaotome

RyougaSaotome

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,710
My mom is from the heights and this is one of the reason she refuses to watch the film.

She saw the trailer and was like, "uh, what now?" It's a real bummer.
 
KoopaTheCasual

KoopaTheCasual

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,778
Glad this is becoming more of a discussion topic.

Is it bad that I'm just happy that none of the leads are straight up White-passing, at least? It's a step forward for sure, but always more work to be done.

I wish Lin Manuel would have actually engaged honestly with this line of questioning, instead of dodging it. Disappointing.
masud said:
I grew up right on the border of Harlem and Washington heights and the spectrum of people in the film looked like what you'd see in the heights to me, and two of the leads were black (is Benny supposed to be Afro Latino?). I'm on board with the push for inclusivity but I don't think this is the film to go after.
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It's not just 'being Black' but also the skin tone diversity of Black folk and other people of color.

That's why Colorism is such a problem, because it's not strictly tied to racism.
 
rucury

rucury

â–˛ Legend â–˛
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
1,386
Puerto Rico
Syriel said:
American academics.

We had a thread on it awhile back but this comic explains it well.

www.google.com

"Latinx" is growing in popularity. I made a comic to help you understand why.

The gender-neutral term that’s supposed to be for everyone, well, isn’t.
www.google.com www.google.com
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At least in Puerto Rico (can't speak for other demographics represented in the movie), latinx is the accepted and most commonly used term.

OT: The video was cringe in the sense that the director and actors were clearly aware that they are in the wrong and got no real excuse for it.
 
masud

masud

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Oct 31, 2017
731
KoopaTheCasual said:
It's not just 'being Black' but also the skin tone diversity of Black folk and other people of color.

That's why Colorism is such a problem, because it's not strictly tied to racism.
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I get that but again as someone who is from that area, it didnt look off to me. Not trying to tell people their concerns aren't valid they just surprised me after seeing the movie.
 
The Teachinator

The Teachinator

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Oct 28, 2017
971
masud said:
I grew up right on the border of Harlem and Washington heights and the spectrum of people in the film looked like what you'd see in the heights to me, and two of the leads were black (is Benny supposed to be Afro Latino?). I'm on board with the push for inclusivity but I don't think this is the film to go after.
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Also from the neighborhood and this movie is as spot on not only in how the neighborhood looked but what it's like to live there.

I also know many people that were in the film. They took pretty much any kid that wanted to be in the production.
 
AlgusUnderdunk

AlgusUnderdunk

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Dec 30, 2020
15,419
On the other side, one of my white relatives had a panic attack when the trailer came on, complaining there was no one she could identify with in the film.

So they screwed themselves over to appeal to a white audience that still sees every person in the film as alien. At least they didn't go full Gods of Egypt.
 

Deleted member 69501

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May 16, 2020
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AlgusUnderdunk said:
On the other side, one of my white relatives had a panic attack when the trailer came on, complaining there was no one she could identify with in the film.

So they screwed themselves over to appeal to a white audience that still sees every person in the film as alien. At least they didn't go full Gods of Egypt.
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This movie was 100% not created to appeal to "white" relatives...

The colorism critisim is fair, though I'd argue not the right film to go after, but let's not pretend this movie is in anyway trying to dilute it's message by trying and failing to pander
 
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Messofanego

Messofanego

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Oct 25, 2017
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