Thursday, September 25, 2008

The Big "O" Joins Princess...


All sorts of tidbits(Mouse droppings) yesterday...

Seems Oprah Winfrey is playing the mother of the Princess in the "Princess and the Frog" film. The talk show queen will play Eudora to Tiana, Disney's first African-American Princess.

Vedy, vedy Interesting. More to follow about all the announcements made...

8 comments:

Tink *~*~* said...

A couple of months ago, I saw an item on YouTube where a woman was criticizing Disney for portraying this particular princess in a racist manner. There have been other items here and there indicating that other portrayals in the film, in addition to the princess, are racist caricatures. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I don't believe Oprah Winfrey would have anything to do with a film that was actually racist. So, if she really is participating in this film, she must be reasonably sure that Disney will not be indulging in any offensive racial stereotypes. Frankly, I think no matter what Disney does, it is inevitable that someone is going to see racist stereotypes in this film, even if they are not there.

Tink *~*~*
My Mobile Adventures *~*~*

Anonymous said...

I doubt it's "racist", per se. But it's hard to avoid the accusation, or some accusation. If everybody in the movie is like the Cosby family, then it's not realistic or it's overly-processed to make it more "palatable" to white audiences. If there's cajun accents, or an vernacular that could be considered specifically "black", then someone is going to say it's racist. Because it's Disney, people are going to say it's racist.

If the reaction is too far over the top, it'll probably a while before Disney attempts to involve African-American culture in their films again (and might have something to do with why it has taken so long) which would be a sad result from people ostensibly trying to "prevent" racism.

But kudos to Disney for taking on the challenge. Hopefully, the overall reaction will be overwhelming positive.

And hopefully the movie itself will be better than the teaser trailer, which I didn't much care for.

Anonymous said...

Nice that the protagonist has mother...a rarity in Disney features. - Tasman

Anonymous said...

Originally, The Cosby Show was supposed to be about a working class family, but Bill Cosby insisted on and upper middle class family since the main characters in an African American centered show had never been doctors or lawyers, hence Cliff and Claire Huxtable had those as their profession. Good Times portrayed a working class African American family that was always struggling to make ends meet. James and Florida Evans like the Huxtable family weren't perfect, but they loved each other and their 3 kids.
Good Times dealt with a lot of real life situations in a more raw way than the Cosby Show. John Amos, who played James was tired of JJ, the oldest Evans kid was a bad role model for Black kids and got fired for his concerns. Esther Rolle left the series the next year over the same concern, but returned a year later. Her leaving forced JJ to grow up and take responsibility.
Ultimately, what we have to understand is that TV is not real. While we want to avoid stereotypes, they will come up from time to time no matter what race you are. Also, situations that would rarely show up in real life will be part of the TV landscape. Why do you think people still watch the Brady Bunch?

Anonymous said...

Simply love Oprah :)

Anonymous said...

Oprah sucks. She's spayed and neutered an entire generation of men.

Grow a pair, boys.

Anonymous said...

Eudora.

Endora turned men into chimps on Bewitched.

Mark said...

Ugh- can't stand Oprah. There are so many other wonderful African American actresses who could do the part instead. Too bad- missed opportunity.