When Well-Intentioned Diversity Falls Short

I recently received a promotional email from Disney+. Which isn't anything out of the ordinary. I get a couple a week promoting their new releases. However, the one I got this week made me a little irritated and made me want to talk about corporate attempts at promoting diversity.

In the past few years, and especially since the murder of George Floyd, companies have been trying to highlight all the ways they're promoting diverse voices and viewpoints. Which is great! We need to hear from new and different and underrepresented voices! However, too often these come off as shameless corporate back-patting and just running down a checklist.

Since a middle-aged white guy talking about diversity is, well, not ideal, I turned to my friend and fellow author, Mary Fan to discuss what make a good project with a diverse cast and what needs to happen for it to rise above corporate platitudes.

VICTOR: So the event that made me want to talk about this topic: I got an email from Disney+ promoting all the great content they had to celebrate Lunar New Year with. And it was so sadly predictable.

I asked you to blindly guess what the films were, and you got them 100% correct: Turning Red, Shang-Chi, and live action Mulan. All of which were made in the last three years, and one of which (Mulan) is terrible. Which struck me as the lamest kind of PR approach to diversity. "Look! We have three whole movies!!!" At the same time, that's three more than they had a decade ago.

So my question to you, what can Disney (and other studios) do to showcase diversity without making it feel like they're checking a box on a list?

MARY FAN: What makes this list particularly hilarious is that none of them have anything to do with Lunar New Year. You wouldn’t see them promoting a Christmas movie list with random movies that take place in England or Germany or something — they promote movies that take place at and center on Christmas! In the case of wanting to promote Lunar New Year but having no movies, well, they’re Disney. They could have commissioned a short or two from new Asian filmmakers

VICTOR That would seem like the least they could do. And I think Turning Red is a fantastic movie! Easily the best Pixar film since Coco! But like you said, nothing to do with Lunar New Year. And they have those Pixar Academy short films! This should be easy!

MARY: Exactly! And in fact it’s kind of cluelessly insulting to showcase generally Asian movies for LNY because it implies that these movies are only worth thinking about on LNY. If it were Asian History Month it’d be a different story. Not to mention, lots of Asian countries celebrate Lunar New Year (which is why that’s the common term now instead of Chinese New Year) yet all the movies they showcase are Chinese. Really, Disney!

VICTOR: This is what I mean by “checking boxes” when it comes to diversity. Disney did a similar thing when it was AAPI Month - Lilo! Moana! And, uh, other stuff! And it takes away from those movies. Turning Red is great! Written and directed by a Chinese-Canadian woman, it’s a wonderful film. But it just becomes a box that gets clicked for an e-mail campaign.

Another thing that made me think about this was the new cartoon on HBO Max, Velma. This is based on the Scooby Doo cartoons, showing how the gang met in high school. One of the twists is that they’ve changed the races of the leads. Velma is now South Asian, Daphne is Chinese (but still with natural red hair), and Shaggy is black.

But the thing is, this seems solely designed to get outrage clicks from angry fans! There’s nothing in the show that would indicate how this could change or affect the character, it’s literally like they clicked a color menu. And that’s all the thought they put into it

MARY: Oh Velma. I haven’t watched the show but it does feel like they’re ticking boxes. Like, I’m all for “take this classic white character and make them a person of color”, but it should have some cultural context, maybe? Also based on all the commentary the show makes a lot of anti-woke “jokes” seemed to cater to right wing humor, which confuses me. Like, are you just trying to give everyone a common enemy?

VICTOR: Jokes is giving Velma too much credit. I reviewed Velma for another website and i panned it, but I tried to make a point about how I didn't like it because the jokes were awful.

The “diversity"just feels so extraneous to the show. Like there is no reason why Velma is South Asian now, it adds nothing to the plot except for a talking point for angry YouTubers Like I think there could be something interesting in making Scooby Gang different races and seeing how that impacts their ability to solve mysteries. But Velma doesn’t really care about that

MARY: I’m somewhat torn about premises like that. Like, on the one hand simply coloring in your cast feels cheap. But on the other, characters and creators of color shouldn't have to be tied to certain expectations. Like, I’m Chinese American, but I don’t necessarily want to write about the immigrant experience or whatever. Sometimes I just want to write about kids solving mysteries who happen to be Asian like me.

In the case of Velma specifically though I think there was a lost opportunity. You’re tying these non-white characters and creators to a legacy originated by white creators about white characters. From a business perspective I get that reimagining existing stories is an easier sell. But also you’re depriving these creators the chance to develop something new, and make characters who are truly their own.

At the same time, I get that it’s exciting to see a familiar character reimagined. Like how people call for a Black James Bond or female Sherlock Holmes. Characters that reach icon status start feeling more like myths than something with a specific canon. Like how stories such as King Arthur have been reimagined so many times before modern sensitivities had anything to do with it.

VICTOR: That very nicely leads into my next topic. I recently saw a production of 1776 on Broadway. If you’re not familiar, this is a Broadway musical about the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The cast is (usually) almost entirely white men playing the founding fathers. The twist here was that the cast was all female, trans and non-binary actors of various races playing the parts

This sounds great! Hamilton did something similar and that is a fantastic show! But, unlike Hamilton, this wasn’t an original musical, it was just the actors plunked into the old script and calling it a day. So, there was a black woman playing John Adams, but she was saying the same lines that Brent Spiner did when I saw the show in 1997. Plus the staging was extremely flat and static

Roundabout is a great company, and I’m sure they had the best of intentions but it just did not work at all

MARY: I remember that show! Hmm this is another topic I’m somewhat torn about. On the one hand, there are some great roles out there written for white men that other performers want to play. Like, who could deny Norm Lewis the chance to play the Phantom or Javert? Or heck, I want to play the Phantom or Javert — just let me take it up a fifth.

I also recall they revived Sweeney Todd once with a woman as Pirelli. But I guess it starts to feel performative when you make a point of gender and/or race swapping your entire cast without adding anything else (come to think of it, a Black Phantom or Javert does add some commentary to both those roles whether intentional or not).

And hey, just because you did an admirable thing in giving marginalized actors good roles doesn’t mean the production can’t stink.

VICTOR: Exactly! And I am pretty sure some African American actors have played Erik. I think I remember Robert Guillaume doing it. And Phantom cast their first black Christine Daae just before they announced their closing.

Fantasy is particularly bad about diversity since so much comes from that Medieval European template. There were fans angry about having one of the houses in the Game of Thrones spin off be black because it wasn’t “historically accurate.” News flash: if you have dragons and zombies the show isn’t concerned about history But it worked absolutely fine in the show!

MARY: Oh yeah, I remember all the hullabaloo about casting a Black Guinevere in Merlin back in the day. Or how those same types were upset about a Black Stormtrooper in Star Wars (they really have no excuses there…)

What these types like to yell about is how entertainment should just cast the best actor for the role. It never occurs to them that the best actor might not be white… Hey, Norm Lewis is my all-time favorite Javert. Before I saw him in the role, I used to detest that character lol

VICTOR: I could go on about this topic for ages, but I’ve kept you too long already. Any final thoughts on diversity done well or examples to follow?

MARY: Hah, we could talk about this forever! There’s so many layers and perspectives that it’s impossible to have one “right” answer. Personally I like the kind of color conscious casting they do in shows like Game of Thrones or Rings of Power or the Little Mermaid, where they cast actors of color in traditionally white roles though the mythology it’s based on is European (and in the case of Rings of Power, penned by someone who clearly reflects the race biases of his time). These stories have become so widespread and admired now, with fans from all backgrounds, and it’s great to give them some representation.

And then there are the utopian shows like every Star Trek ever, each trying to boldly go where no (or few) directors have gone before. It’s a hopelessly optimistic view but sometimes it’s nice. And of course we do need culturally specific entertainment, like the movies that started this whole conversation (Turning Red, Shang Chi, Mulan). We need lots and lots of it, and where there’s a gap, those with power should use their vast resources to fill it. So when you want to send out a Lunar New Year email, you have some actual Lunar New Year stories to showcase.

My thanks to Mary for joining me this week. And a festive Lunar New Year to all who celebrate.

Victor Catano lives in New York City with his wonderful wife, Kim, and his adorable pughuaua, Danerys. When not writing, he works in live theater as a stage manager, production manager, and chaos coordinator. His hobbies include coffee, Broadway musicals, and complaining about the NY Mets and Philadelphia Eagles. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @vgcatano and find his books on Amazon