Kerry Washington, Aziz Ansari, Tracee Ellis Ross, and Courtney B. Vance sat down to interview one another on some real issues that plague Hollywood for Variety. Find out all they said inside….
By now you know stereotyping in Hollywood is no secret. “Scandal” star Kerry Washington and “Master of None” star and executive producer Aziz Ansari have faced being stereotyped for roles all throughout their careers. Now, their dishing their horror stories in Variety’s fourth season of “Actors on Actors.”
The "Confirmation" star and executive producer revealed she was fired from two TV pilots because she wasn’t “black enough” before landing her gig on “Scandal.” She said:
“Before ‘Scandal,’ I was actually cast in two other pilots. Both went to series, but I was fired and recast,” Washington said. “For both, it was because they wanted me to sound more ‘girlfriend,’ more like ‘hood,’ more ‘urban.'”
Kerry soon found out that stereotyping in Hollywood didn’t just stop at race.
“I’ve had friends of mine say like they’re tired of ‘gayface’ and I was like, ‘What’s gayface?’ They were like, ‘It’s the gay version of blackface, like come in and be more effeminate,”‘ Kerry said.
This doesn’t surprise us.
You can check out their full conversation below:
In another interview..
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“black•ish” star Tracee Ellis Ross and “People vs. OJ Simpson” star Courtney B. Vance sat down for Variety’s “Actors on Actors” series to chop it up about dealing with racial issues on their respective shows.
Below are a few highlights:
Vance: Because you’ve got to laugh through the pain, too. That’s why the show is so beautiful — because as a people, we have gone through so much. I was 7 and 8 when Martin Luther King was shot and Malcolm X and Bobby Kennedy and John. How did our parents live, survive?
Ross: And hold on and thrive. This is the part that always baffles me. There are times when I think of being a black person in this country, and me being a woman. There’s a moment in your show when he says, “In 1988, that was not considered rape.” And you think of the Robert Shapiro character in this piece that you are in, saying please don’t do this now, as if it is you being burdensome, and how come you can’t just leave this alone, this race thing. How courageous of “Black-ish” to be touching on these topics.
Vance: What a beautiful thing that on a TV comedy seen by millions every week, we can talk about it. I mean for the longest time…
Ross: We have not.
Vance:… we didn’t talk about it. Our parents talked about it, and we heard it, just like the children in your show. But now we’re watching that conversation happen on television — and all people can watch it. Black, white…
Ross: That’s one of the things that’s amazing to me. “Black-ish” is set in current times. So doing a police-brutality episode in current times, when kids are watching our show, it gives them an access point to have these kinds of conversations as a family. That’s one of the things I love: People watch as a family. And we have all these different generations. It’s character-based, so we’re not touching on these things because they’re circumstantial or situations, but because this is how these people would be interacting. What’s amazing to me watching “People v. O.J.” is how similar these topics are. How do you tell the stories with the nuance they deserve? Because these are topics that have so much nuance in them — so much gray.
Check a clip from their interview below:
You can catch both “Variety Studio: Actors on Actors” interviews will premiere June 12th and June 19th on PBS SoCal.
Meanwhile....
The 43-year-old actress slayed her way to the Fragrance Foundation Awards presented by Hearst Magazines in NYC yesterday. Chick brought the sophisticated fab in an all-black Paule Ka suit paired with red platform heels and a colorful clutch we’re drooling over.
Inside, she caught up with singer-songwriter Lionel Richie.
Photos: Variety/Getty
