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Don't just TALK about Whitewashing 

Chickasaw storyteller, Mary Thompson Fisher's journey to fame reimagined the movie Te Ata

Te Ata (TAY' AH-TAH) is a beautiful inspiring true story of Mary Thompson Fisher, a First Nations woman who became one of the greatest performers of her generation. Te Ata made her debut as an artist during her senior year of college performing songs and stories from several different indigenous tribes.

Steven Moffat on Diversity on Doctor Who: “It’s a Show That Has No Excuse.”

Doctor Who Magazine is currently celebrating its 500th issue with a special collectors edition that’s full of cool stuff, including an interview with Steven Moffat wherein he speaks honestly about diversity on Doctor Who, and about how even though the supporting cast has been one of the most racially diverse on British television, they could still do better.

As reported by Doctor Who TV, Moffat says that casting a black actress as the Doctor’s new companion was “an absolute decision, because we need to do better on that.” He says that even though Doctor Who‘s casts have been pretty diverse since the show returned in 2005—starting with Noel Clarke’s Mickey being the first black person to set foot on the TARDIS (and being a sort-of companion alongside Rose)—they could always do better. Indeed, there’s no excuse not to.

“Sometimes the nature of a particular show – historical dramas, for instance – makes diversity more of a challenge,” he says. “But Doctor Who has absolutely nowhere to hide on this. Young people watching have to know that they’ve a place in the future. That really matters.”

He made one really interesting comment that illuminates the mindset of someone with white privilege working on a television show. About the show up until this point, Moffat said, “I had this baffling idea that if we just threw open each part to everybody, it would all work out in the end. I put my faith, inexplicably, in the free market. It doesn’t work. You can only cast for talent – you’ve got to cast the best person, every single time – but you’ve got to gauge where you’re looking for the talent.”

So many well-intentioned people in the entertainment industry have that same notion: that it’s simply a matter of who is or isn’t auditioning, and then they’ll say that they “weren’t able to find” a certain race to play a role. Yet they look in the same places and don’t make it a priority to cast a wider net and go to where the people they want to find are. They don’t take things like barriers to access into account when they should, and I think it’s great that Moffat is recognizing that.

Pitching For the Big Leagues: how a show about a female professional athlete plans to shake up the game  

Pitch is officially on the Fox TV lineup for the 2016-17 season; airing Tuesdays at 9pm.  The series—reminiscent of the real life story of former Little League Baseball pitcher Mo’ne Davis—follows Ginny Baker, Canadian-born Kylie Bunbury, as the first female pitcher drafted into the Major League Baseball, a female Jackie Robinson, if you may.

Thrust into the limelight and under immense pressure not to fail, Ginny struggles with the expectations, both professional and personal.

There’s much banking on the series, and its stars, which includes Mark Paul Gosselaar a.k.a. Zack Morris, insist it more than lives up to the buzz.  The show’s creator and showrunner, Dan Fogelman, told the Hollywood Reporter:

“It's a real coming-of-age story. It will transcend baseball and sports. That's been part of the fun: figuring out what that will look like when a woman breaks the gender barrier in one of the four major professional sports.”

The series draws inspiration from the story of Mo’ne Davis, who became one of only two girls to play in the Little League World Series 2014, and who was the first girl to earn a win and to pitch a shutout in Little League World Series history.

More than its groundbreaking premise, Pitch is the first television show about baseball, America’s favorite pastime, and it’s the first sports-oriented show to center on a female professional athlete. Moreover, the series is the first to work directly with the Major League Baseball, which provides expertise and extra players to help with its authenticity—in the series, the San Diego Padres drafts Ginny.

The hope for Pitch is that the script is handled similarly to shows like Friday Night Lights, which grounded itself in a real time and place, and balanced the lives of the athletes against their on-field games. It’s unclear what the balance between the glitzy baseball sequences and the off-screen drama will be, but judging by the trailer, it looks promising.

Raunchy, Smart, Awkward and Silly, There is So Much More to See on Flat3.

If you are looking for a new webseries, it’s time to follow the adventures of three Kiwi-Asian twenty-something roommates trying to navigate through life in the innovative New Zealand comedy web series, Flat3.

Seeking to diverge from the “audition droughts and painful FOB [Fresh off the Boat] accents”, leading ladies JJ Fong, Ally Xue and Perlina Lau teamed up with director and writer Roseanne Liang of My Wedding and Other Secrets and pulled together $1000 of their own funds to produce the first season of the independent comedy.

 Flat3 is described as “a New Zealand comedy web series” which stars co-creators JJ Fong as Jessica, Perlina Lau as Perlina, and Ally Xue as Lee. Fong, Lau and Xue had each work on various television and theatrical projects before lending their talents to this hilarious web series. Since premièring on YouTube and Vimeo in February 2013, Flat3 has been going strong.

Flat3 is refreshing in its comedic way of investigating stereotypes in gender and race. In its first episode, Lee attends career counselling and expresses her interest in the arts while her counsellor makes the assumption that she’d be good at maths. In Perlina’s first central episode, she goes through a breakup with a boy who started dating her primarily because he deemed her “exotic”. Struggling actress Jessica attends an audition thinking the best way to land a gig is to put on an exaggerated accent - a reality that is now being addressed more frequently in shows such as Aziz Ansari’s Master of None. As young women, they are desperately trying to navigate the halls of romance, careers, individuality and self-confidence with ingenuity and humour. The style of the web series is self-described as "sometimes smart, often silly, a little rude and a lot awkward".

In an interview for the New Zealand Herald, Lau comments on the originality of having female Asians in leading roles: "Three girls, all of us are Asian obviously, and that in itself was enough for us to be able to go, 'Yeah, we don't know anyone else making that'." Most of the content, especially in the first and second season, is taken from the creators’ own experiences, providing insight into female Kiwi culture while remaining engaging to a wide audience.

Flat3 is not only relatable but it brings to light everyday topics and real life situations but from a part of New Zealand culture that we would not normally be accustom to seeing. It highlights the unfortunately familiar racial and gender stereotypes in a refreshingly hilarious way but also helps us to broaden our understanding and stretch our global knowledge and acceptance. It tells the story of the diverse New Zealand landscape that is often ignored or overlooked by mainstream entertainment.

The initial success of the first season garnered a loyal following and through an Indiegogo campaign, they raised more than $5,000 for the following season. The third season received funding from the government agency New Zealand On Air, allowing the show runners more creative expansion in production value and guest appearances.

 On their YouTube channel viewers can currently watch the first three seasons of Flat3 and it looks like Season 4 is on it's way in 2016.

In a February 8th, 2016 blog post, in connection with diversity on screen and the 'race card' Team Flat3 wrote: “It's a big step forward. And we understand that to get to Fresh Prince, there needed to be The Cosby Show, and to get to black people integrated into comedies, there needed to be Fresh Prince.  But why does it take a whole cast of Asians to make an Asian show? What about a majority Asian show? What about a 40% Asian show? Raybon Kan was right in his last opinion piece, if there was a real show about medical services, 50% of the staff would be Asian. If it was a show about science majors at uni, it would be like 70% Asian. Why does it have to be 100% or 1%. And I mean fully integrated, not the roles Lucy Liu had to take in her early career. We're not asking for our day in the sun. Or trying to start a race war. We're just asking for the diversity of our cities to be reflected on TV and film. Like, actually. Please.”  

YouTube has long been a place to show case an array of global talent, share our stories and flex our need for diversity. Flat3 has done a fantastic job by marvellously outlining all three.

If you have not checked out this awesome channel be sure to do it here.

Also subscribe to keep up to date with all that is going on with the cast and creative company. Let us support this amazing New Zealand web series.

CNTRST.EXPOSED Utilizes Data to Demonstrate that Equal Representation on Film is an Issue

CNTRST.EXPOSED is a Netherlands-based website that measures the percentage of Caucasian actors compared to actors of colour who work in many main stream movies in the western world. The online project focuses on the main cast of many popular movies over the past recent years. The results presented on this website are alarming but not surprising.  

In Captain America: Civil War, 78% of the main cast were white actors compared to the movie The 5th Wave, which had an disappointing 100%.  In other words, the movie failed to have at least one person of color as part of the main cast. Surprisingly, according to the website results, movies with non-Caucasian lead actors, were more inclusive. For example, in Ride Along 2, 55% of the main cast were white compared to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which many media outlets praised for its inclusion, ranked at 82%.  

Such statistics represent an absurd unbalance, especially when films and television shows with casts who roughly reflect a nation's racial and ethnic diversity often post the highest box office and ratings numbers, on average.

There is no justifiable reason for the vast majority of western films to employ a main cast with no actors of color, especially when it is not profitable. However, being aware of this imbalance in representation can encourage more awareness on the issue and help many acknowledge that there is an overwhelming lack of diversity in film that has had a profound effect on audiences.

DUMBFOUNDEAD - SAFE

Recently, Buenos Aires born, Los Angeles based rapper Dumbfoundead released a music video for his song “Safe”. The video was inspired by the ongoing whitewashing, and the lack of opportunities of Asian actors in media.

On his Facebook page, the rappers note that "After the last Academy Awards and the regular whitewashing of Hollywood roles, I wrote this song and made this video adding my piece to the conversation."

He continued by encouraging his fans to “share their experiences or stories about this issue” of representation.