Screenwriting & Writing Race

By Koji Steven | Thursday, August 18, 2011 | 16 Comments

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Take a look at the image below:

232px hermann grid illusionsvg tm Screenwriting & Writing Race

Do you see the gray blobs? Those gray blobs are tricks of the eye and don’t really exist. This illusion is known as the Herrmann Grid. Why do I show you this? Because I think of the grid every time I write a screenplay.

Let me explain…

As Americans, our perceptions of the world (and ourselves) are all wrong. I once gave a talk to a group of high school students and gave them the “if the world were 100 people quiz.” I won’t go into it here because most of you have gotten the forward at one point or another but the majority of the students didn’t realize there were so many people of color in the world.

Why? Because that’s not who they see on television or in movies. (I’m not going to argue that Hollywood or television is racist. I don’t think they are. To me, it’s all about the money. But that debate is a different article.)

One of the first things I realized as a writer was that if I didn’t give a character a race, it was assumed that he/she was Caucasian. That’s not a bad thing per se, but as an Asian American it was an eye opening realization. I started to think about my favorite characters from books and was startled to find that I had imagined they were all white (unless they had ethnic specific name). But why couldn’t they be Latino, Asian, or black?

We all do this. Don’t believe me? Read this sentence:

“Tom, 20, a muscular man in swim trunks, and Marcia, 18, beautiful in a bikini, are on vacation when a group of international thugs kidnap them.”

What do Tom and Marcia look like? Most would imagine Tom and Marcia like this:

But why can’t they look like this?

And this also applies to other sectors of our society. If I say undocumented worker, most imagine:

But an undocumented worker could also look like this:

Chinese Screenwriting & Writing Race

What about a CEO? What does a CEO look like? Most imagine a CEO looks like this:

But a CEO can also look like this:

Akemi headshot 2008 3x4 5 jpg 200x200 crop sharpen q85 Screenwriting & Writing Race

This is why being overt about the name/age/gender/sexual orientation/class of your character is so important and the only way is to ensure color/diversity is added to your projects and to the world of popular culture. This goes for books, comic books, short stories, anime, films, television, and even in the stories you tell your friends.

So in the end, the Hermann Grid reminds me to be cognizant of what I put out there in the world because I have the power to change and/or reinforce perceptions.

I’m going to be teaching an introduction to screenwriting class at Visual Communication here in Los Angeles this fall. If you’ve always wanted to write a screenplay, what are you waiting for? This class is limited to 15 students. For more information, click on the link.

Categories:

Entertainment

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http://www.bigwowo.com/ bigWOWO

This is that “Default Human Being” thing. I wrote something about this last year:

http://www.bigwowo.com/2010/06/the-default-human-being/

The most interesting thing to me was my own conceptions. I always assumed that the Backyardigans were White, but if you delve deeper into the creator’s story and look at the names of the characters, it’s clear that one should not assume Whiteness. It’s the same deal with anime characters: Americans assume Whiteness when they see cartoons unless you give the character stereotypical racial features, which is why many think those big anime eyes (which are certainly bigger than any real White person’s eyes) mean that the character is White.

By the way, the world will stop if they ever make a movie with that muscular Asian Tom and beautiful Asian Marcia in a bikini. They might put Asian Marcia with a White Tom, or they might put White Marcia with a White Tom, but if they ever put an Asian dude like that with an Asian woman like that and make them the focus of the story, the world will stop, if only for a second. If that ever happens, I may beat the international thugs and kidnap them myself, just to congratulate them on getting some recognition for a different kind of story.
Reechard

Empowering. Fascinated!
http://thylacine.livejournal.com/ ErikaHarada

Not to mention, beauty is subjective but I bet people thought of a thin blonde because they’re the societally accepted idea of “beautiful”.
raymonst

so simple, yet so effective.
mwei

@bigWOWO if they can manage to make Katherine Hepburn take on yellowface, then no wonder Noah Ringer thinks all he needs is simply a tan…
VanCityNights

@bigWOWO They did make a film in the United States with Asian guys with a hot latina and white chick: Harold and Maria, Kumar and Vanessa, in Harold & Kumar.

World didn’t stop, nobody really batted an eye. Hollywood liked it so much their is a 3rd film in the series about to be released, with Harold being married to Maria.
bigWOWO

True that! @mwei
http://www.bigwowo.com/ bigWOWO

@VanCityNights Sure! Howard and Kumar was groundbreaking. I know at least one guy who says he thinks it’s the best Asian American film period. But there are two differences between my statement and the example of Howard and Kumar.

First and foremost, Harold and Maria weren’t the main focus of the movie: Harold and KUMAR were. Maria hardly had any screen time. I wouldn’t be surprised if you added up all her screen time and came up with something south of two minutes.

Second of all, I was talking of AM/AF, not AM/WF or AM/LF. Anna and the King was groundbreaking and had an AM/WF focus, but I have yet to see a major motion picture with AM/AF as the focus. Hollywood seems to think that you have to have at least one major White character to justify making a movie.
mwei

@bigWOWO@VanCityNights which is even all the more amazing nowadays considering that Flower Drum Song came out more than 50 years ago.
VanCityNights

@bigWOWO In that case, there are 0 major studio films with an Asian female/White male character either, so it’s not as if Hollywood is being outright racist. There’s just not real market for it.

There are indies that focus on Asian male/Asian female relationships that have been successful in North American film festivals, 2 films that come to mind are The People I’ve Slept With, and Shanghai Kiss. (I know I look like a geek for even knowing this, but I’m a big fan of Indie films, especially ones featuring cute Asian girls). Canada had such films, such as the upcoming series Millions, and CBC miniseries Dragon Boys which featured Asian-Canadian families speaking both English/Cantonese. There are other indies which feature complex white female, asian male relationships too such as French Film Hiroshima Mon Amour.

As far as Harold & Kumar goes, most of Maria’s screentime in the first episode involved him making out with Harold in an elevator (isn’t that what most Asian-American guys whine about, the Asian males not getting enough on-screen action)? In the 2nd film, the whole purpose of the trip to Amsterdam was so Harold could find Maria. So, there’s really not anything to complain about in that film, I thought Asian-Americans were portrayed in a very humourous, but intelligent way.

Interestingly, in the first film, there was an Asian-American girl, Cindy Kim, who was suppose to have a thing for Harold. But she came off as a super-nerd, so Harold didn’t like her. Reverse of gender-roles for Asians in that scenario, and nobody brought it up. I didn’t have any Asian-American female blogger complain about an Asian female being portrayed as a nerd, and the Asian-American guy going for a hot non-Asian girl.
mwei

@VanCityNights well, just one peek at craigslist (and it’s the same for other casting websites) shows that AF don’t have any issues with not being hypersexualized in the media. in fact, the nerdy AF is probably stereotype breaking over the dragon lady caricature.

http://losangeles.craigslist.org/search/ggg?query=asian&catAbb=tlg&srchType=A&addThree=
bigWOWO

Van, you wrote: “In that case, there are 0 major studio films with an Asian female/White male character either, so it’s not as if Hollywood is being outright racist. There’s just not real market for it.”

I’m sorry, I’m totally not comprehending what you’re saying. So because there aren’t any Hollywood films with Asian females, Hollywood is NOT racist? I would think that you’d reach exactly the opposite conclusion with your statement.

I didn’t understand the rest of your comment either. Why would Asian female bloggers complain about Cindy Kim–a minor character who is different and unique and serves as new kind of character? Why would Asian female bloggers complain about the Asian American guy going for a hot non-Asian girl?

I’m totally not understanding your point. Are you responding to something I said, or are you making a new statement of some kind? Please clarify.

@VanCityNights
Rainshadow

I’m black, but it’s so interesting to read about somebody else’s racial experiences in the United States. A stereotype about Asians is that they’re all totally fine with the way things are, and “don’t need” media representation and don’t “make trouble” by demanding visibility. Sadly, I believed this for a while, because I never saw or heard anyone Asian/Asian American complain about their sitch television. I realize now that everyone has just been ignoring you. Another note – Hollywood has issues with showing any minority couples having a good, healthy relationship with one another – rarely do you see a happy couple of the same race who isn’t white.
mwei

@Rainshadow the power of US mass media to perpetuate stereotypes is almost as powerful as its ability to ignore issues they don’t want people to know.
VanCityNights

@bigWOWO My point is was that your original assertion was off-base: “They might put Asian Marcia with a White Tom, or they might put White Marcia with a White Tom, but if they ever put an Asian dude like that with an Asian woman like that and make them the focus of the story, the world will stop.”

Hollywood will put whoever it is together that will sell tickets at the box office.

There have been Hollywood studio films with Asian guy/Asian girl couples: Better Luck Tomorrow. And there have been Hollywood studio films with Asian guy/Non Asian girl couples.

You complain that Hollywood would put a white male/asian female character together, but never an asian male/asian girl then i pointed out examples where they did. And where they’ve also put asian male/non-asian females together.

Regardless, Asians only make up about 2% of the population of the United States anyways (even Britain has double-that, Canada has way way more). And honestly, most of that older population, the FOBs, and the population in Engineering/IT couldn’t care less about “equal portrayal of Asians in Hollywood”. I’ve talked to a lot these people, and they really just don’t care about support of Asians in Hollywood. So until stories featuring Asian males/Asian females prove to sell in Hollywood, why would they bother producing the films? It has less to do with racism, more to do with money. Hollywood Studios spent a lot of money bought films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and Hero (all Asian casts), because they sold at the Box Office. That’s all they care about.
http://www.bigwowo.com/ bigWOWO

Thanks for the clarification.

First, I’m not really sure I agree with your original statement that “there are 0 major studio films with an Asian female/White male character either.” Karate Kid 2 was produced by Columbia Pictures, which isn’t small. Joy Luck Club, which features lots of AF/WM, was Hollywood Pictures. Come See the Paradise was 20th Century Fox, which is pretty big. Miami Vice was made by Universal. Of course they had Chow Yun Fat on the other side for that one shot exception.

Keep in mind that I don’t think AF are getting a free ride either. I think Hollywood is very selective as to the type of roles that it gives to Asian women. I think there is racism against Asian women (which is why your statement confused me). The main point of my post is that they haven’t yet shown any inclination of putting an Asian woman with an Asian man.

As for the racism thing, I still disagree with you. Think about your statement: “So until stories featuring Asian males/Asian females prove to sell in Hollywood, why would they bother producing the films?” So the major studios haven’t created/sold these movies, therefore they will not sell. We need to prove that they will sell, even if we’re not selling them. Do you see the logical problem? You’re saying they won’t sell because the studios aren’t selling them. They have to sell them before they can say whether or not they will sell, right?

This is akin to “I don’t hire black people because black people have never worked here or proven they can do the work.”

Of course you could use indies like BLT as “proof” they won’t sell, but I think that’s being a bit unfair. Most “white” indies don’t become blockbuster romantic comedies or action movies, so I don’t know why we would have a higher standard for Asian American movies.

(Also, Asians are almost 5% of the U.S. population.)

@VanCityNights

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