panto race debate
Posted by RYAN HORNCHURCH on 16/9/2020, 4:37 pm
I find it sad that the race debate is now making it into panto. I swear it is only a matter of time before the role of the dame is brought into question and frowned upon. Currently there is a lot of hype going on around 2 English men being cast as THE chinese poiceman when they are not actually chinese. I PERSONALLY feel this is a step to far, where do we stop, can women only play women and men only play men, I speak as someone who loves everyone and does not see anyone for their colour, race, age, sexual preference or anything like that. I find this argument, particularly in relation to a pantomime to be very hard to comprehend and quite worrying. I have seen pantomime cast cristised for being too white, on one occasion one critised for being too black, i just feel that people are cast according to availability and talent regardless or colour/race/sexuality and it is is only people over thinking the issue that creates the problem that i really do not think is always there. I believe the entertainment industry is the most encompassing industry of all and if we are at a point where a black actor or a white actor HAS to be cast to balance things out then you are simply doing political casting rather than casting on talent and thebest person for the role. Does this make sense? I hope so, i'm trying to word things as I see them without causing offence. I am just worried that something has been started, I believe by Simon Sladen (apolagies if I am wrong on that) that is going to be realy harmful to the genre. Cast for talent not because you feel you have to cast a person of particular colour to avoid upsetting anyone.
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