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Apr. 24th, 2003 10:11 am
(no subject)
Note that it is not the job of television fiction to accurately reflect the racial makeup of modern society. The writers/producers of ER should not be expected to go out, find out what percentage of doctors are of each racial group, and then hire a cast that accurately reflects those percentages.
Their job is to tell a story, and preferably tell it well.
Sure, I get annoyed when a show set in San Francisco has no Asians in it, whether leads or background. But I don't expect the show to be perfectly accurate; I expect it to entertain me.
That being said, I really like the JMS method of casting: Write the story. Do not mention race when sending out casting calls. Audition every actor who shows up and choose the best person. If you then end up with a Korean character named "Matheson" then so be it. (JMS has changed character names before to reflect the actor's nationality, but only on rare occasions and when it makes sense in the production. For B5, he almost never did it.)
Now, he doesn't /always/ do that; there are characters who were created to be Asian, or English, or whatever. But they're the exception to his normal rules.
Their job is to tell a story, and preferably tell it well.
Sure, I get annoyed when a show set in San Francisco has no Asians in it, whether leads or background. But I don't expect the show to be perfectly accurate; I expect it to entertain me.
That being said, I really like the JMS method of casting: Write the story. Do not mention race when sending out casting calls. Audition every actor who shows up and choose the best person. If you then end up with a Korean character named "Matheson" then so be it. (JMS has changed character names before to reflect the actor's nationality, but only on rare occasions and when it makes sense in the production. For B5, he almost never did it.)
Now, he doesn't /always/ do that; there are characters who were created to be Asian, or English, or whatever. But they're the exception to his normal rules.
