Non-Traditional Casting at the Stratford Festival

Romeo and Juliet opened at the Stratford Festival yesterday. Juliet is played by Nikki M. James (she is also Anika Noni Rose’s replacement in Caesar and Cleopatra, which will open later this summer), who is black and Gareth Potter (white), plays Romeo.

You don’t usually see this sort of thing at the very traditional Stratford Festvial.

Toronto Star review of Romeo and Juliet

Geez, people….do you have to throw race into EVERYTHING?

Racialicious has a post today about a recent Quiznos commercial where an elderly laundry manager eats a $5 bill. The elderly laundry manager is of Asian descent. Now, I have seen this commercial, and I just thought the entire thing was stupid (just like many food-related commercials today), but I would never think of it as racist. Perhaps it’s because some people in our society are just a little too race-sensitive. I mean, I could totally hear people going bananas over a commercial, movie or television show where an Asian woman is portrayed as very society matron-like. After all, she’s obviously TRYING TO BE WHITE, right (by the way, no pun intended on this one)? And an Asian person, especially a woman trying to be white is A STEREOTYPE we want to get rid of. People will say that, despite there being dozens of “old money-esque” society matrons in places like Hong Kong and Singapore.

Now, I *DO* think this commercial is a little demeaning to people of a certain age.

Another thing I want to add:  Who’s to say that they intended to cast an Asian actress for this?  The audition notice could very well have only asked for someone who can play a woman of a certain age.  Not all notices specify race.  While white is the default for “race neutral” casting (for the most part, anyway), people need to remember that colour-blind casting IS done, though it seems to be more common in live theatre (as I’ve said before, the television/movie crowd is probably a tad bit too sensitive to go for something like this)

Note from ChineseCanuck:  Hello?  Just because I’m of Chinese descent (Chinese Canadians share a similar history to Chinese Americans, btw), doesn’t mean that I have to be offended by the commercial.  In fact, I think most people take the race thing too seriously, and I don’t think I’ll ever understand why as you can see from my posts.