Little People Want to be Dwarves by ANTHONYT

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Little People Want to be Dwarves

POSTED BY: ANTHONYT
UPDATED: Friday, June 8, 2012 17:33
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VIEWED: 4087
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Thursday, June 7, 2012 3:06 PM

Freedom is Important because People are Important

http://marquee.blogs.cnn.com/2012/06/07/snow-white-movie-under-fire-fo
r-not-hiring-little-people/?hpt=hp_c2

Hello,

I can understand why it may feel unjust if little people were not allowed to try out for the roles of Dwarves.

On the other hand, I know that unless all little people were used, it could prove very difficult to film the movie from a technical angle. The forced perspective shots become much more challenging when you are alternating full grown actors and little actors together with the increased frequency required in a group of mismatched dwarf characters.

So the case of The Hobbit may be technical expediency rather than unjust hiring practices.

I do agree with the little people that they should be free to apply for roles where stature is not a dictated component of the character.

--Anthony

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 3:54 PM

OONJERAH

Peter Dinklage has impressive credits. Doesn't always play a dwarf.

As for the protest by Little People of America, I agree with it. Dwarves
don't look like normal people made small; midgets do. Since the story was
originally & forever Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, I'd much prefer
to see dwarves playing the dwarves.

The substitution harkens back to white actors in blackface ca. 100 years ago.

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 4:10 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Quote:
The substitution harkens back to white actors in blackface ca. 100 years ago.

Hello,

I think sometimes yes, and sometimes no. I think the goal should be to get the best actor for the role to play the role.

(Eddie Murphy in 'Coming to America' wearing 'white face' and doing a damn good job.)

Quote:
Peter Dinklage has impressive credits.

I will pause now to gush over the fabulousness of Peter Dinklage. He plays my favorite character on Game of Thrones. I've yet to see him in a scene where I wasn't thrilled with his performance.

Quote:
Dwarves don't look like normal people made small; midgets do.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this.

--Anthony

Note to Self:
Raptor - women who want to control their reproductive processes are sluts.
Wulf - Niki is a stupid fucking bitch who should hurry up and die.
Never forget what these men are.
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” -Thomas Szasz

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 4:45 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

I wanted to supplement my last post with an example of 'blackface' I consider to be abominable. Perhaps it is called 'yellowface' in this case though that makes me feel skeevy to write it.

--Anthony

Note to Self:
Raptor - women who want to control their reproductive processes are sluts.
Wulf - Niki is a stupid fucking bitch who should hurry up and die.
Never forget what these men are.
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” -Thomas Szasz

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 6:10 PM

OONJERAH

Al Jolson in blackface, 1909 -

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 6:44 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

That was before the Jazz Singer, wasn't it?

--Anthony

Note to Self:
Raptor - women who want to control their reproductive processes are sluts.
Wulf - Niki is a stupid fucking bitch who should hurry up and die.
Never forget what these men are.
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” -Thomas Szasz

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 7:20 PM

OONJERAH

Quote Oonjerah: "Dwarves don't look like normal people made small; midgets do."

Medically speaking what is the difference between a dwarf and a midget?
[Partial best Answer, Yahoo.]

Midget was a medical term referring to an extremely short but normally-proportioned
person (e.g., with growth hormone deficiency), and was used in contrast to dwarf,
which denoted disproportionate shortness . . .
Dwarfism is a condition in which a person, animal or plant is much below the ordinary
size of the species. When applied to people, it implies not just extreme shortness,
but a degree of disproportion . . .

Achondroplasia, or short-limb dwarfism, is the most common form of abnormally short
stature in adults. It is caused by a mutation in a single gene on chromosome 4 that
regulates the conversion of cartilage to bone.

To me, the different proportions of dwarves was always apparent. Especially when
you see them in the ring.

Googling the topic, I see many have adopted the opinion that midgets and dwarves
are the same -- to me, they are not. As I read further, I see that both words, dwarf
and midget, were, have been, may still be, heard as quite derogatory and hurtful to
many people. All of this is news to me, eventho it's clear that anyone who is different,
especially with an obvious, physical difference, being smaller, will be ridiculed and
teased mercilessly.

Today, as I write this, "little person" is the acceptable term.

ETA, quote Billy Barty: "The name of my condition is Cartilage
Hair Syndrome Hypoplasia, but you can just call me Billy."

That's a rare form of dwarfism.

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 7:44 PM

HKCAVALIER

But the "dwarves" of Snow White are mythological creatures that merely share a name with the little people of reality. It strikes me that it's a little like demanding that all werewolves be played by black people because their fur is dark. It's kinda apples and oranges. The dwarves in Snow White or The Hobbit are not afflicted with dwarfism. The actors playing them are not playing short humans, they're playing a different race of creature. If someone were to remake "The Station Agent" with a normally statured man altered by cgi to look like a man with dwarfism, that would be your equivalent of "The Jazz Singer" and very creepy and wrong.

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 8:10 PM

OONJERAH

Quote Anthony: "Eddie Murphy in 'Coming to America' wearing 'white face'
and doing a damn good job."

the character, Saul =>
According to John Landis, it was his idea to have Eddie Murphy wear makeup to
play a Jewish man as a sort of payback for Jewish comedians wearing blackface
in the early 1900's.

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

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Thursday, June 7, 2012 8:15 PM

OONJERAH

Quote HKC: "The dwarves in Snow White or The Hobbit are not afflicted with dwarfism."

Peter Dinklage woulda been great as Gimli!

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Friday, June 8, 2012 2:17 AM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by Oonjerah:

Peter Dinklage woulda been great as Gimli!

I have no doubt he'd be able to fill the role, but I think I'd rather have seen him as on of the 13 dwarves in The vHobbit.

And as an aside, while he did a good job, I wasn't keen on John Rhys-Davies as both Gimli AND the voice of Treebeard. I think finding ONE more actor to properly fill the role of Treebeard wouldn't have broken the budget. To me, every time Treebeard spoke, I heard Gimli speaking.

" We're all just folk. " - Mal

" AU, that was great, LOL!! " - Chrisisall

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Friday, June 8, 2012 4:37 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Quote:
Originally posted by Oonjerah:
Quote Anthony: "Eddie Murphy in 'Coming to America' wearing 'white face'
and doing a damn good job."

the character, Saul =>
According to John Landis, it was his idea to have Eddie Murphy wear makeup to
play a Jewish man as a sort of payback for Jewish comedians wearing blackface
in the early 1900's.

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

Hello,

The irony here is that I did not know it was a black man of any stripe, much less Eddie Murphy, until the end credits revealed it to me. That was just excellent makeup and acting, to me.

Traditional blackface artists left little doubt, though their motives were not always sinister. It is interesting to read the responses and reviews of the era to see what people at the time thought of it.

In Breakfast at Tiffany's, I observed the worst possible type of racial mockery and it has horrifified me every time I think of it. This was not done with any motive beyond cruelty for a laugh. I can't rewatch the movie for the sake of those scenes.

In any event, as I said before, I can see the technical difficulty of finding a dozen little people suitable to the roles of dwarves. And if half of them are little people and half of them are normal sized people it can pose some interesting technical challenges. One of the nice things about making the Hobbit is that Dwarves and Hobbits are all roughly proportionate to each other, so you do not need to do much FX trickery for much of the film. Whereas if you had a mixed bag of little people and normal sized people, every damn scene would need extra work put in.

In such a case, where there aren't necessarily twelve great little people actors you'd like to use, and where using a mixed bag creates FX nightmares, I can see going with a uniformly sized cast even when it cuts out opportunities for little people actors.

--Anthony

Note to Self:
Raptor - women who want to control their reproductive processes are sluts.
Wulf - Niki is a stupid fucking bitch who should hurry up and die.
Never forget what these men are.
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” -Thomas Szasz

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Friday, June 8, 2012 11:22 AM

OONJERAH

Breakfast at Tiffany's, 1961, Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard,
with Andy Williams singing Moon River in the background.
Mickey Rooney as Mr. Yunioshi, Holly's apartment manager?

At 18, I quite enjoyed Breakfast at Tiffany's, in spite of the fact
that Peppard was always a bit of a dud to me. There was nothing
objectionable in it. I mainly recall Holly's panic when she briefly
lost Cat.

A few years ago, 40-45 years after its release, I went to watch it again.
When Mr. Yunioshi appeared and began yapping at Holly, I was shocked!
I didn't remember him at all! But movies had long since moved away from
such cheap, racist parodies; and even I was resensitized to it.
The movie was ruined for me; I turned it off.

Wiki: The 1961 New York Times review of the film said that "Mickey Rooney's bucktoothed,
myopic Japanese is broadly exotic." In 1993, the Daily News of Los Angeles wrote that
the role "would have been an offensive stereotype even played by an Asian; the casting
of Mickey Rooney added insult to injury".

More recent characterizations include "cringe-inducing stereotype," "painful, misguided,"
"overtly racist," "one of the most egregiously horrible 'comic' impersonations of an Asian
(Mr. Yunioshi) in the history of movies," ...

Does Hollywood show better taste now? I doubt it.
What we are taught to love or hate or laugh at now is just different than it was.
Human beings need to love and hate and laugh at Somebody!

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

If I have to react to others all the time, then they own my mind more than I do.
If I let others tell me how to feel, I lose my ability to choose happiness.
If I let others tell me who I am, I've vacated self-definition.
Finally, I realized how foolish I was to give others such power over me.

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Friday, June 8, 2012 11:38 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Quote:
A few years ago, 40-45 years after its release, I went to watch it again.
When Mr. Yunioshi appeared and began yapping at Holly, I was shocked!
I didn't remember him at all! But movies had long since moved away from
such cheap, racist parodies; and even I was resensitized to it.
The movie was ruined for me; I turned it off.

Hello,

I had a similar response when I came across some old Loony Toons from WWII-Korea. I was... disappointed, to say the least.

Would I have even noticed had I seen these classics when I was 9 years old? Probably not.

I think things are getting better, but you may be right that in 20-30 years I may look back on the cinema of today, even things I enjoyed thoroughly, and remark about how terrible the stereotypes are.

--Anthony

Note to Self:
Raptor - women who want to control their reproductive processes are sluts.
Wulf - Niki is a stupid fucking bitch who should hurry up and die.
Never forget what these men are.
“The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” -Thomas Szasz

NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | TOP | HOME

Friday, June 8, 2012 11:47 AM

OONJERAH

Quote HKC: "The dwarves in Snow White or The Hobbit are not afflicted with dwarfism."

Yes, Now I see what you mean.
I must have had the D&D side of my brain on hold to argue against it.
In mythical times, we had a race of dwarves, a race of elfs, a race of hobbits,
all quite naturally themselves.
Indeed, Bob Hoskins looks like a natural dwarf to me, only taller.

=========================
I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. ~Charles R Swindoll

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Friday, June 8, 2012 5:33 PM

MAGONSDAUGHTER

Quote:
Originally posted by ANTHONYT:

Hello,

I wanted to supplement my last post with an example of 'blackface' I consider to be abominable. Perhaps it is called 'yellowface' in this case though that makes me feel skeevy to write it.

--Anthony

That was a very bad casting move. Ruined the movie.

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