Hollywood Doesn’t Care About Representation

“The Hunger Games” is that glimmer of hope for many moviegoers wishing to see more films with women in the lead. Yes, it is possible for ladies to be the hero, to be the center of a film that’s still financially successful! In The Hunger Games trilogy, written by Suzanne Collins, Katniss Everdeen is the ideal role model for girls. Her strength doesn’t overpower her emotions because her emotions drive all of the books. She’s a leader, a sister, a friend, and a protector—someone whose actions you can relate to even though the subject matter of the story is extreme. She’s an expert at archery but she’s neither a robotic character nor a killing machine. She’s human.

Most importantly, Katniss is described as a woman of color in the books. What a great opportunity to introduce audiences to a female role model who isn’t white—except in the movies she is white. Watching “The Hunger Games” is disappointing because the film could’ve been so much more than just a successful blockbuster with another white protagonist. Katniss is a great person to look up to, but Hollywood has ruined her image. The movie emphasizes in showing how different the wealthy civilians in the Capital live in comparison of the those in the poor Districts, but it never touched upon an issue that was prevalent throughout the first book: Katniss’ skin tone was constantly brought up. 

Early in the book, Katniss explains how her skin is dark just like others who worked in the coalmines (including her late father): “Straight black hair, olive skin, we even have the same gray eyes. But we're not related, at least not closely. Most of the families who work the mines resemble one another this way. That's why my mother and Prim, with their light hair and blue eyes, always look out of place. They are. My mother's parents were part of the small merchant class...”

How obvious is it that she’s biracial? An actress of color could’ve made the difference, could’ve been the role model for little girls of color who are only used to seeing white women kick ass. Not only that, but casting a white woman in the lead completely diminishes the message of the books. In essence, The Hunger Games is about a woman of color fighting the oppression that she and other districts face because of their race and class. So when the opportunity arises to present a nonwhite role model to the film, wouldn’t common sense agree with that? Apparently not, because roles keep getting whitewashed in Hollywood. When the casting call for the first “Hunger Games” movie came out, it called for only white actresses. 

Why call for only white actresses when Katniss isn't white? The truth is that Hollywood prevents minority actors from skyrocketing to fame like Jennifer Lawrence did when she nabbed the lead role. She was going to hit the A-list even if she didn’t play Katniss—Lawrence already had an Oscar nomination and was starring in the X-Men franchise. Playing Katniss is just another role in her filmography compared to how important it is for minority women to be represented fairly and accurately in film.

This is just one case of whitewashing out of several—Hollywood is shameless about its unfair casting practices. Jake Gyllenhaal in “Prince of Persia,” Carey Mulligan in “Drive,” Ben Affleck in “Argo,” Angelina Jolie in “The Mighty Heart,” Jennifer Connelly in “A Beautiful Mind,” Johnny Depp in “The Lone Ranger,” Benedict Cumberbatch in “Star Trek Into Darkness”…these are only a handful of whitewashed roles that we’ve seen within the past few years.

And it’s not stopping anytime soon! This year alone there’ve been three big-budget films that have had whitewashed roles in the lead—“Edge of Tomorrow,” “The Hunger Games” and “Exodus: Gods and Kings,” the latter of which takes the cake for the most racist casting ever: a film that takes place in Africa and requires African actors for the lead are replaced with white actors with tans while the actors who are actually African are playing roles such as “Egyptian Thief” and “Egyptian Lower Class Civilian.” Unknown actors are playing all of these roles.

Instead of casting Christian Bale as Moses, they could’ve went with Rami Malek, who’s actually of Egyptian descent. He played an Egyptian king in the “Night at the Museum” movies so why couldn’t he be considered for this upcoming blockbuster? Even more recent is news that Margot Robbie and Scarlett Johansson are in competition for the leading role in “Ghost in the Shell,” a live-action adaptation of the Japanese anime where the female lead is Japanese.

Margot Robbie and Scarlett Johansson are not Japanese—why would you even consider them? Wouldn’t it make sense to cast an actress such as Rinko Kikuchi, who’s actually Japanese and has starred in a Hollywood blockbuster, “Pacific Rim?” If you’re an actor of color, it’s already difficult to break out in Hollywood and although Rinko has an Oscar nomination and a successful blockbuster under her belt, she still can’t be considered for the lead without a white actress being considered first despite the role being for a Japanese woman.

White actors are always put first, no matter what. Just like “The Hunger Games,” “Drive” was originally a book. In the book, the love interest was a Latina woman named Irene. But in the movie Carey Mulligan plays her, and she’s white. When asked why he chose Mulligan instead of a Latina actress, director Nicolas Winding Refn said: “I couldn’t find any actress that would click with me personally. I couldn’t make a decision for some reason. I had all this talent in front of me and out of the blue I get a call from Carey because she wanted to meet me about doing a movie. She came by the house and she walked in and I realized, ‘Oh my God, this is what I was looking for.’ I wanted to protect her…and I knew that was the Driver’s motivation.” 

So Refn couldn’t “click” with any Latina actress but the minute a white actress walks in for a role she gets it? How unfair is that? When actors of color try to audition for roles that require their ethnicity, they’re denied. Earlier this year, Rooney Mara was cast as Tiger Lily in Joe Wright’s upcoming “Pan.” The problem? Tiger Lily is Native American and Rooney Mara is white. Out of all minority actors in Hollywood, Native Americans get the least representation. Bah Studios released a graph that exposed casting practices in Hollywood, and the results were unsurprising but disappointing nonetheless: 0% of leading roles went to Native American actors. The fact that Native American roles are constantly whitewashed is a huge contributor to that 0%.

According to Prospector Films, Kawennahere Devery Jacobs (a Mohawk actress from Canada) auditioned for the role of Tiger Lily but the studio told her that they weren’t looking for a Native American actress.  The role of a Native American woman can’t even go to a Native American actress. When Joe Wright announced that he was directing “Pan,” he said that he wanted to create a world that’s “very international and multi-racial.” How can you say that when you’re directly contributing to whitewashing?

There’s nothing diverse about racist casting practices, and the sad truth is that Hollywood isn’t stopping anytime soon. These types of casting problems are exactly what’s wrong with our society today. Despite being the most diverse country in the world, we fail to fairly represent different ethnicities and backgrounds in the media. Hollywood is a reflection of life in America—if you’re white, you get a vast amount of opportunities, but the same can’t be said for people of color.

As a woman of color aspiring to work in the film industry, seeing this type of oppression is both discouraging and upsetting because it shows that Hollywood has never cared about minorities and won’t make the effort to accurately represent us. Out of all of these whitewashed roles, “The Hunger Games” casting is the most offensive to me because in mainstream film, female role models of color are nonexistent. So to see Hollywood erase Katniss’ image is not only insulting to the book’s message but it’s spitting in the face of the millions of fans who looked up to Katniss because she’s a woman of color fighting a lifetime of oppression—something that so many of us still have to deal with daily in society.