The Fading Histories of People of Colour: Depardieu Plays Dumas
By Deputy Editor Thea Lim
Reader Carleandria sent us this link to an article from the Times Online, discussing a controversy that is gaining ground in France after the release of a biopic on French writer Alexandre “The Three Musketeers” Dumas starring Gérard Depardieu:
A fuss over race has soured the release of the latest film in which Gérard Depardieu takes on one of the giants of French history. Black actors and anti-racism campaigners are upset that the white star is cast as Alexandre Dumas, the country’s biggest national hero with mixed blood.
The blonde, blue-eyed Depardieu sports curly hair and darker skin in L’Autre Dumas [trailer here], directed by Safy Nebbou. Dumas, who is still probably the world’s best-loved French author, was an exuberant, high-living celebrity — like Depardieu. His paternal grandmother was a former Haitian slave. His father, a Napoleonic-era general, was deemed to be a Caribbean “negro”. In his lifetime, the novelist was mocked for his African features and he called himself ”un nègre”.
…Non-white celebrities, some Dumas experts and black organisations are angry because they say that the producers missed a chance to celebrate France’s ethnic diversity and remind the world of the writer’s part black origins.
“There is a mechanism of permanent discrimination by silence,” said Jacques Martial, a black actor who made his name playing a television police detective. Patrick Lozès, President of the Council of Black Associations (CRAN) wondered: “In 150 years time, could the role of Barack Obama be played in a film by a white actor with a fuzzy wig? Can Martin Luther King be played by a white?”
…In a protest on the internet, the CRAN said that the casting of Depardieu was fresh evidence of France’s failure to promote non-white stars in its cinema and media. “Very few of our compatriots know that Alexandre Dumas was mixed race and considered to be a black in his lifetime,” it said.
The film commits a double sin in the CRAN’s eyes because its plot, adapted from a successful play, discredits Dumas’ genius by depicting his white assistant as the true creator of his works. “Possibly for commercial reasons, they are white-washing Dumas in order to blacken him further,” it said.
…Dumas’ Wikipedia entry (yes, sorry) contains a quote in which Dumas replied to a taunt about being black. “My father was a mulatto, my grandfather was a Negro, and my great-grandfather a monkey. You see, Sir, my family starts where yours ends.”
Personally I had no idea that Dumas was black. This makes me wonder how many famous people of colour – especially those of mixed heritage – are white-washed by history. I also recently learned (through another reader tip!) that the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin was black too.
POC reclamation project, anyone?
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
Link(s): Mon, Mar 1st, 12pm to Wed, Mar 3rd, 5pm | Your Revolution (The Blog!) on 04 Mar 2010 at 2:23 am
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