So a few nights ago, I was watching some Access Hollywood programme airing on VH1 about all the hot young Hollywood stars. They did a segment on each actor or actress, recounting some of their exploits and who they were dating. All of them were white. The one young African American actor they featured, Donald Faison, did a three minute segment where he ran around with a paintball team and goofed it up. They never once recounted his past exploits or explored who he was dating. Instead I was struck by the mnstrel type quailty of the piece in which this young man allowed himself to be seen only as a someone that can be laughed at. There were other comedic actors included in the programme, he is the only one that was painted in such a one dimensional light.
What is interesting, is that at the beginning of the segment, while the camera crew filmed him changing his clothes to get ready to go play paintball, he pointed to biker short clad prosterior and said to the camera, “You see that ass? That’s Hollywood ass.”
Riiiiiggggghhhhhtttttt….. I am inclined to agree.
I am amazed that in this day and age, that such caricatures are still allowed to propagate. I wonder if Faison actually knew what he was being filmed for. It is not inconceivable that is the producers told him the clip would be included in a programme that did not feature such glowing reporting from a number of ‘experts’ in Hollywood commenting on each actor and actresses rise and claim to fame. None of those experts made any commentary on Faison at all.
The entire clip was him running around playing paintball and being almost over the top funny…. not naturally so, the humour seemed forced.
However, the out of place nature of Faison’s piece in this programme has me a little suspicious of the motives.
Where was Faison’s publicist?
What were the Access Hollywood people thinking? How can they legitimise their choice to include the clip at all?
I turned off the TV immediately following, not impressed.
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