By Alexis Garrett Stodghill, BlackVoices.com
MTV/Maverick Films
I came onto the whole 'Twilight' vampire craze rather late in the game. As a black woman in her thirties, I am not in the target audience for this mega-smash-hit, which was intended for the young adult audience. But personal experiences aside, objective observation attests to the fact that millions of teens, women and men of all races have read 'Twilight,' and fallen in love with Bella Swan and Edward Cullen. Despite its intended demographic, I personally have met people of all kinds who enjoy the sweet love story and engaging horror-action of the novel 'Twilight' deeply and intensely.
But books are one thing, and movies another. Movies are engineered for mass appeal and maximum ticket sales. The main characters of 'Twilight' are all lily white, which is a problem, and I don't mean that as a p.c. judgment. Literally, every main interaction in the book occurs between white characters. This has certainly not hurt book sales, as the enduring experience of true romance is universal. But this is exactly the kind of one-sided on-screen representation that would have audiences outside of the rabid 'Twilight' fan base fuming.
As the point of the movie is in part to lure additional audiences into the 'Twilight' fray, the film has become an
A fairly seasoned actor with a string of TV and movie credits, Gathegi takes on the role of Laurent, who comes in rather late in 'Twilight,' displaying some sexy skin in a leather jacket, no shirt. The vampire in the novel is only described as French with an olive complexion. But "black" Laurent for the movie has huge dreadlocks, and is featured rather prominently on some versions of the movie posters, hopefully giving this tokenized actor some major shine.
As an avid lover of all four books in the 'Twilight' saga, I find this move on the part of the movie producers rather insulting and a little unnecessary. Pandering to the "of color" population in this way feels similar to the way McCain pandered to women by adding Palin to his ticket. It's a "nice," yet ultimately shallow and insulting gesture. I know everything in a movie version of a book cannot remain exactly the same, but this little alteration seems like a rather silly thing to have changed for minimal benefit. But then again, I think the casting for Eward and Bella sucks, too, and I am clearly in the minority.
Are you planning to see 'Twilight' the movie? Do you love the book as much as I do? Leave your thoughts below.
Comments: (44)
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By: BluPanther on 11/20/2008 7:07PM
I don't think he is the token black. He beat out several white actors to get that part which was THE most coveted part of the movie. It's a main character and the people who cast him took a huge risk to do so as the role was written for a white person. The said that they felt he was a very strong actor who would do the role justice. Many racial slurs were bandied about, about him on many sites. He was Boa on Lincoln Heights, an intern on House, and is now acting in the ABC movie, Life On Mars
You can read about him on this link http://alusainc.wordpress.com/2008/02/19/edi-mue-gathegi-california/
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By: Alexis Stodghill on 11/20/2008 7:28PM
Wow. That's interesting news. And it's interesting to learn that he is also of Kenyan decent, like Obama. There are so many people putting Africa on the map this year.
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By: Abraham on 11/21/2008 1:50AM
I don't feel that they R trying to use him as the "token" black. Most movies only place the token due to a lack of any other minority but the Twilight saga focuses not only on Bella and her vampire friends but also their fued with the areas native american tribe due to the fact that...I don't want to say because I'm sure not everyone has read the book and may want to see the movies. And besides that if anyone reads all the books they would know that by the fourth movie there will be too many people of different nationalities to even count.
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By: BluPanther on 11/21/2008 8:40AM
There is a site that highlights Africans in entertainment. Thandie Newton, Idris Elba, Osi Umenyiora, Liya Kebede, Iman, Alek Wek...it's a huge list. http://www.jamati.com
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By: platinumtch1 on 11/21/2008 12:31PM
what the hell is "twilight"?????!!!!!
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By: Alexis Stodghill on 11/21/2008 12:33PM
Hi, Abraham. I have read all four books, but I am just talking about the first one. In the first book, Jacob Black is really a minor character. Even in the last book which has a diversity of characters, they are still minor characters that sort of come in at the end. They are not developed as fleshed-out, full-fledged people with feelings, emotions, etc., and their development is not critical to the story arc. In terms of the Native Americans in the story, I think it is a very interesting take on race to present in a book series. I think that it's great for diversity, but as Native Americans are not a huge part of the population, I am wondering if the producers are still going to try and add more blacks and latinos to the future films to appeal to a broader spectrum of people. I feel like part of what I am saying is that books vs. movies require different things in terms of representation, and that in trying to meet these needs to boost sales among large non-white populations, the producers engaged in tokenism. There is a big difference between a character appearing in a film, or book, and having them being presented as a full-fledged character central to the emotional arc of the story. Jacob Black is not in that position for the first book, although he may be in the movie.
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By: stanya on 11/21/2008 12:48PM
does it really matter. what i would like to see is a black writer, write about a black vampire. it may never be as big as twlight or anne rice, but i do believe it's time. if there is one book out there please let me know.
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By: Donna Monday on 6/14/2009 10:38AM
I have stepped up to the plate and written a novel that features black vampire main characters.
Check it out here:
http://www.donnamonday.com
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By: Uriah Jordan on 11/21/2008 1:19PM
I never read any of these books. Vampires never really interested me. I was more into the wolfman. I enjoyed the contrast between the day and night characters. The depiction of the modern vampire is actually quite sad. The modern vampire seems to be more like a foreign exchange student than an actual threat and is used as a tool to expose intolerance than as a prop for the horror genre.
But as movies go we can't say that this is the first time we've seen someone plced in a movie to hunt the black dollar. Jennifer Hudson was in Sex in The City, Samuel Jackson is going to play Nicy Fury, the adopted black kid on the 90210 show and others too numerous to mention. The problem with these characters are the writers who more-so-than-not have very little exposure to what it is like being black in America and have even less compulsion to research the matter. The end result are characters that could easily be replaced with cardboard cut-outs. Is it any wonder that many popular shows like LOST and HEROES purged themselves of all their black characters? The writers could not write them without falling back into some neo-D.W. Griffith rendition of black males or some verbally abusive testosterone destroying head-waving, finger-snapping harpy of a sister (when playing oposite a black male). The charaters that many of us play in Hollywood are simple re-treaded products of old biases lurking in the minds of the writers.
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By: chas jr on 11/21/2008 1:21PM
I'm waiting for the DVD
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