“This script is fantastic. Let’s get Julia Roberts to play Harriet Tubman.”

I vote for Danny DeVito

Reminds me of the bit at the end of Deadpool when he says they were considering Keira Kightly for Cable because she has range.

- Completely unrealistic and unwatchable. Suit needs to be tan.
  
  Don't forget his choice in condiments.
  
  Take it easy man, we do not want to over stage Citizen Kane, here.
  Mr. Tan Suit would win best supporting actor, AND best costume design, by itself.
- World's first white first black president.

Hollywood Executives can collectively only name at most seven actors at a given time. An entire nine-digit annual industry run by a bunch of coked-up goldfish.
- All of these large industries are run by idiots
  
  They're run by the same average people who work for them. You don't need to be an idiot to fuck up running something as large and complicated as a trans-national corporation. You don't need to be a genius to coast in a position that already prints money.
  We're simply not that different from one another. The genius/idiot dichotomy is far more about variances in education, culture, and propagandized bigotry than finding actual differences in intellect.

Queue Dave Chappelle and his sketch 'Negrodamas'
Quote
I predict a movie called The Last Black Man on Earth, starring Tom Hanks
- For some reason you reminded me of this.
  
  Thanks for sharing! Had no idea NASSA existed *�
- I mean, if its a documentary on the last black man on earth, it couldn't actually be played by a black man.
  Unless it was produced in space, or on another planet, I suppose.
  
  Have you considered that
  (a) documentaries do not need actors, and
  (b) if they did, the last black man earth could star as himself?

Next Summer they'll show Black Hitler
- I would not be surprised if that was the title of Kanye’s next album.
  
  Maybe he's doing a reverse Joaquin Phoenix, going from music artist to actor, just with more antisemitism.
  
  ~~Kanye~~
  Clayton West
- Just a reminder this was a real show
  https://youtu.be/mf9jJx0NSjw
  Only aired like one episode though
  
  How did they get so far as producing an entire episode? Seriously?!
  
  Conan had Jewish Hitler on at one point. I think Sarah Silverman talked about it on a podcast recently but I can't remember which one right now
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DcrmnRijTQ
- Hitlack or Blitler?

Oh god, it's real.
- So it was 30 years ago. I feel like, even though things are far from perfect now, nowadays a comment like this would draw quite a few more critical looks than back then.
  
  People in 1994 knew exactly how fucked this was.
  
  It was also 30 years closer to Harriet Tubman, in a time when black civil rights were not even as sanded smooth as they appear now.
  
  Why would you think that? I was around in 1994, and if anything, it got worse.
- Look up who Alec McGuiness played in Lawrence of Arabia.
  
  Or look at Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Or Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra. Or John Wayne in Gengis Khan.
- It's such an insane story that I wonder what the other side of it is. It's easy to imagine the guy just having got out of a meeting ten minutes earlier with "if you don't get Julia Roberts into a movie by the end of the week, I'll see you never work in this town again!" ringing in his ears.

This is obviously a perfect role for Ryan Gosling
- AI Morgan Freeman
  
  Why AI? Wtf, you made me think he died. Don't do this to me.
- I think he is already scheduled to star in the MLK movie, so not sure he would have the time

Hmmm so you need woman of colour? Maybe Gal Gadot? /s
- If Hollywood ever did a film about Gaza they would unironically use Gal Godot in the role of a Palestinian woman.
  
  It also be “both sides have something to learn from each other!” Oscar bait a la Crash or Green Book.
  
  No doubt with lines like "They only hate Israel because of their religion" and "The IDF is protecting me, despite being Palestinian"

citation needed
- Unproven
- Did they not publish their casual conversation for peer review???
- Citation is that this is a meme.

Same as when SNL wanted men to play female politicians in sketches when Amy Poehler and Tina Fey were right there and smashed it in the end.
- SNL is comedy, and there's comedy in using a man to portray a woman. That's not the same as using the wrong sort of person because you think it doesn't matter
  
  Ok, you choose a man instead of Tina Fey to play a Sarah Palin and see how much funnier that won't be.

- I do not get it. I just see 3 pictures of Tubman.
  
  I want to argue but tbh it was so long ago that I don’t really see a difference

This is crazy, I mean Roberts is from the South and Tubman from the north, no one's going to believe it!
- True! It's called acting for a reason.
  
  Howdy y'all- cough cough Hey youse guys. I'm walkin' 'ere!

Being rich doesn’t mean you’re smart.
- The average Hollywood executive is really dumb, but they tend to be great talkers and networkers.
  
  they tend to be great talkers and networkers
  This is selling them a bit short. They're also generally pretty good at raping aspiring actresses.

Am I the only one who doesn't know who Harriet Tubman is?
- Probably not, but she's an important figure of the American history. The real question, though, is who will know about Harriet Tubman in a few years, once she gets erased from American history books.
  
  At least people will be able to remember she looked like Julia Roberts
  
  Yeah, she died in 1913, if she has not been erased in 112 years, and with people still wanting to make a movie about her...
  Perhaps you may be leaning into conspiracy theories and are fear mongering yourself and others. Stop it.
  Here, from Wikipedia:
  Parks, monuments, and historical sites
  National parks and national monuments related to Tubman in the United States are the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Monument and the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Historical Park, both in Maryland,[215] and the Harriet Tubman National Historical Park in Auburn.[216] The Salem Chapel in St. Catharines, Canada where Tubman worshipped, is a National Historic Site of Canada.[217]
  The city of Auburn, New York has several historical sites related to Tubman, including her gravesite.[218][219] Other state and local historical sites about Tubman include the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad State Park [220] and the Harriet Tubman Memorial Garden [221] in Maryland, and the Harriet Tubman Museum is in New Jersey.[222]
  Artistic portrayals
  Tubman is the subject of many works of art. Musicians including Woody Guthrie, Wynton Marsalis, and Walter Robinson have written songs celebrating her.[223] She is the subject of operas by Thea Musgrave,[224] Nkeiru Okoye,[225] and Hilda Paredes,[226] as well as plays by Carolyn Gage and a collaboration of May Miller and Willis Richardson.[227] Tubman is the focus of novels by Elizabeth Cobbs,[228] Marcy Heidish,[229] Anne Parrish,[230] and Bob the Drag Queen,[231] and is a character in novels by Terry Bisson,[232] Ta-Nehisi Coates,[233] and James McBride.[234]
  Since Tubman's life was first dramatized on television in a 1963 episode of the series The Great Adventure,[235] she has been portrayed in TV productions such as The Good Lord Bird,[236] Timeless,[237] Underground,[236] and A Woman Called Moses.[238] Cynthia Erivo received an Academy Award nomination for portraying Tubman in the 2019 biographical film Harriet.[239]
  Dozens of schools,[247] streets and highways,[248] church groups, social organizations, and government agencies have been named after Tubman.[249] In 1944, the United States Maritime Commission launched the SS Harriet Tubman, its first Liberty ship named for a black woman.[211]
  On November 11, 2024, Tubman was posthumously commissioned as a one-star general in the Maryland National Guard in recognition of her military service during the Civil War.[250]
  Edit: Look at the people downvoting this pro-Tubman post. LOL
- TL;DR, she was an insanely brave black woman who helped a metric fuck ton of slaves escape the south.
- Does the phrase "underground railroad" mean anything to you?
  
  Not everyone is from North America. That is like me asking you, does "Dr. Kwame Nkrumah" mean anything to you?
  
  ...no?
  
  We call it the subway or the metro nowadays.
  
  Like the Eurostar
- She's the original free runner https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1dhATC-ekQ
- Never be afraid to ask a question to rectify a lack of knowledge.

The article led me down a rabbit hole leading to an article about the ghost in the shell movie adaptation promo meme generator being used to criticise the whitewashing in the movie adaptation
Fuck whitewashing

Halle Berry though... 🤔
- Kevin Hart.
- Martin Lawrence would rock it in "Big Tubman's House"
  
  I’m going to hell for this upvote.
- Would have been a better role than catwoman
  
  I'm a top exec for a very big movie company and I hear you on this. No more Julia Roberts. Got it. Roberts out, Catwoman in. ...
  Someone get me Michelle Pfeiffer on the phone. I have a great idea, Catwoman as Harry Tubmen.
  That's an Oscar winner, right there.
- Halle Berry, or hallelujah

"Hollywood is crazy. The Last Samurai, staring Tom Cruise..?!"
- The last Samurai is not played by Tom Cruise. He plays a guy who gets to know and grows to respect the last Samurai and Japanese culture.
  Ken Watanabe as Lord Moritsugu Katsumoto, he plays the eponymous "Last Samurai."
  Clearly you have not even watched the damn movie. Or what is your point?
  But we are all good with a black woman playing the real life British Anne Boleyn?
  Man, can't wait until we find out which white actor will play Barack Obama in his biopic. I mean, diversity is our strength.
  
  Yeah, Tom Cruise was The First Weeaboo.
  
  1-You had to actually watch the full movie to get any of that context
  2-It's still Cruise's face front and center on every piece of promotional art
  3-As much as I hate that this is true, the vast majority of people who saw that movie did not do so because they heard Ken Watanabe was in it
  
  So, you missed the link...? Or, just lost your sense of humor in the war?
  ETA: when did i say that Tom Cruise was the last samurai..?
  
  I have watched the movie. It shows a European in a role absolutely impossible in upper layers of Japanese society of that time.
- What are they gonna do next? The Last Ni*** on Earth, starring Tom Hanks?
  this is a quote from Chapelle's show, just to be clear
- Hollywood is a cult.
  
  Blueberry pancakes are delicious.

They should get Lisa Kudrow to play Rosa Parks.
- Conan O'Brien as Desmond Tutu.
  
  Rose O'Donnell as George Washington Carver.

This is what makeup is for
- That would get them a lot of publicity
  
  She's the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude.

https://pbfcomics.com/comics/now-showing/
- Tbh - if you do any academic study of history, that’s what it all starts to look like.
  I tried to watch Spartacus because Kubrick and… I couldn’t. Those fucking hairdos. The depiction of Marcus Aurelius in Gladiator upset me - like no, the man was not a proto Thomas Jefferson (and even the IRL Jefferson made his money on child slavery and raped children.) Wuxia is so much fun but there’s never going to be a period accurate Three Kingdoms (which is a 14th century novel anyway)
  Medieval history especially…. That’s pages and pages, and I’m not even really that much of a medievalist.
  
  I do historical reenactment, so I have a hobby that involves researching the age of a certain embroidery stitch, for example.
  I've learned to just switch off that part of my brain for games and movies, or I'd cry a lot more. I just project them to an alternate reality where they totally had nylon in 1200.
  
  Medieval history especially
  At least we have Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
  
  pretty much any 'historical' movies are completely unwatchable to me
  
  Tbh - if you do any academic study of history, that’s what it all starts to look like.
  Even without academic studies - I wanted some context for Tolkien (analogous periods\events), Walter Scott, Dumas, who not. And I wanted some context for R:TW and M2:TW games, so I found mods like Europa Barbarorum. And eventually I've read some of Icelandic sagas, and some of medieval poetry translations, and so on. Same with context for fantasy books, some alternatives IRL.
  So, after that, there's just nothing on screen I can watch.
  Icelandic low-budget movie kinda associated with Beowulf, but making Grendel a neanderthal (yep), looked cool due to seemingly authentic buildings and weapons and clothes and everything. But it wasn't a very interesting movie.
  I've seen a Danish low-budget movie "Eagle's eye", some things felt like fine, but again, the story itself just didn't seem right. Except for the one-eyed guy seeing through the eye of a bird - eh, I dunno why it was an eagle and not a raven, but his relation with the king and with the bishop seemed an interesting allegory on heathenry and christendom.
  Roman empire - just leave me alone.
  like no, the man was not a proto Thomas Jefferson
  The man also, when he found out his wife had a lover, made her a bath filled with his blood. That was in his youth, but.
  At the same time he called her "so meek, so simple-minded, so kind" when thanking gods for her.
  He became very wise by the end of his life, but, eh, not in US founding fathers' direction. More like Obi-Wan Kenobi made emperor.

Tyler Perry?
- Fun story - I went to a troubled teen facility, and we had “group.” There was no actual qualifications required for the people running “group.”
  We watched Tyler Perry movies. (Also at one point Ip Man which is a goated film.) I learned the phrase “give head” or similar while watching How Did I Get Married. I was asked to think about the lessons that this movie could apply to my interpersonal relationships - I had never considered how the frequency of oral sex would decease after marriage.

"We're not going back."

I mean they do this all time, for example, that amazon series about lord of the rings.
- Not real people and their skin color has nothing to do with the story. Biopics about black people generally have to do with their struggles as a black person so having a white person play them is wrong and dilutes the value of that person's story because a white person doesn't have the same adversities.

It’s weird how the reverse is somehow ok now. Anne Boleyn played by a black woman why not? Historical accurac? What even is that?? .
Edit: you’re all ignoring that most of the roles being blackwashed are not white, how is it ok for black culture to just appropriate our own ethnic figures?
- Because people aren't depicting Jesus as a white Caucasian male?
  If the skin colour isn't relevant to the story, it doesn't matter. If it is relevant, it does.
  
  Jesus was a Palestinian, so it’s ok to take Arab jobs and give em to black actors? Cleopatra was Greek/arab so I guess they can take their roles too.
  It’s funny how everyone who isn’t black is suddenly white when it’s convenient. This isn’t black actors taking the roles of white Americans, it’s black actors playing Egyptians, Greeks, arabs, latinos, Asians. Are all those people white??
  
  So I can hire Toby McGuire to play Sammy Davis jr and nobody will be mad?
- It is different, if color of skin is a relevant part of the context of the story. Having John Brown played by a black man would be equally misleading.
  For Anne Boleyn's story on the other hand, racism did not play a part, because it wasn't even invented yet.
  
  Did… did you just say racism wasnt a thing in 1530s Tudor England?
  
  ...ok hol' up.
  racism did not play a part, because it wasn't even invented yet.
  Racism wasn't invented before 1536, the year she got beheaded? The Portuguese had already transported the first slave ship to Brazil 10yr earlier, even if we pretend there was complete racial harmony before the transatlantic slave trade began, which is an absolutely insane thing to pretend, that still started before her death. Not to mention the fact that racism (and slavery no less) has been around since long before "transatlantic" was even a concept.
- White people were never opressed and there is no danger of erasing white people and their achievements from history, so yes, the reverse is very ok.
  
  As someone loves history, it’s not ok. Especially when the “white” people being erased aren’t even white. Cleopatra wasn’t white but she’s sure as hell wasn’t black. A lot of the characters being turned black are Greek, Latino, Irish, Italian, Arab, Asian. So is that ok? For a black actor to get the job of every other race? Why not a blank woman playing pancho villa? Maybe get idris alba to play the Dali lama.
  
  White people were never opressed
  You need to study history then. Even if you mean oppressed in the US your narrative is wrong:
  https://www.lagazzettaitaliana.com/history-culture/8996-america-land-of-liberty-prejudice-against-italians-in-the-early-20th-century
  https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1206&context=qc_pubs
  https://pressbooks.ulib.csuohio.edu/italian-americans-and-their-communities-of-cleveland/chapter/chapter-6-anti-italian-sentiment-in-america/
  https://www.nytimes.com/1976/03/25/archives/polishamericans-mounting-counterdrive-against-stereotyping.html
  https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/104973239200200205
  and so on....

This executive is drunk, and possibly racist, no one is doing blackface!
Edit: Changed the wording for clarity since people were downvoting
- Except Justin Trudeau, an more than once, too. This is why up here the Liberal party refused to pass a Resolution damning black face. It would make them... Hmm.. lose face if his pictures were more widely known.

Parks, monuments, and historical sites

Artistic portrayals