AIBU to think objections to Snape casting are mostly racist?

But he was just as unlikely casting as Paapa Essiedu -- too old, too handsome, too patrician, not the greasy-haired, hook-nosed grotesque of the HP books.

I think the whole "being true to the time" thing is crap tbh especially period dramas. People were manky, they barely washed, they had all sorts of diseases, infections, parasites, they didn't have proper sanitary wear, or plumbing. If you can cope with seeing clean peasants in the 1800s or whatever you can cope with seeing a black teacher in 1990. I find it really strange that people have such an issue with different skin colours, it's acting, men can be women, women can be men, queens can be black, bullies can be ginger. They're literally pretending to be someone they're not, you KNOW he isn't actually professor snape, because he isn't even a real person, it's not his skin colour giving away the game.

And he arguably wasn't even the worst of the child actors. There is a lot of room to improve there.

Yes. I mean, an 'accurate' film/TV adaptation of, say, Pride and Prejudice would involve hairy-legged, hairy-armpitted, crooked-toothed, greasy-haired, unmade-up Bennet sisters getting scarlet and sweaty at balls, and they're far from peasants -- women of that period washed their hair very seldom and relied on daily brushing to keep it 'clean' (ish), there were very few ways of 'improving' your appearance or covering, say, a bad, spotty or blotchy complexion, and the only reason we see so many slow, stately dances in adaptations typically is because the dancing needs to be arranged around the actors saying lines. The overwhelming majority of the dances would have been the kind of thing we now think of as ceilidh dancing, and everyone would have been hot and sticky (and smelly).

Even Miss Bingley says Lizzy Bennet's teeth are only 'tolerable', probably meaning none obviously missing or discoloured.

I bet even if modern directors were trying to cast a Pride and Prejudice adaptation the way people then actually looked, they still wouldn't be able to stop themselves making Lizzy more attractive than Jane. They never can.

Exactly, the whole Hermione and Dobby stories were about racism. Now they've changed the source material to what was not intentioned - that Harry and friends are basically racists, the audience are supposed to hate Snape - all the way until we find he is actually one of the good guys.

For all the ones saying those who object are racist, well, I'm Chinese, how would you feel if the whole cast - Harry et al were Chinese? If that doesn't feel right to you, then why not? Ooh I know, because you're racist!

I'm sure there are actual racists that object, but most of us are just like if you have to have him, then cast him as any other male but Snape!

It was the one thing I appreciated about the one with Keira Knightley and Matthew McFadyen -- Rosamund Pike in it is far more obviously pretty than KK. It was quite a brave piece of casting, I thought, especially as the 1790s dresses didn't suit thin, long-necked, rangy KK at all.

Also, Snape puts the fear of God into all Hogwarts pupils (bar the odd senior Slytherin) by virtue of his physical presence as much as through his sarcasm and cruelty.
First years definitely freak out at the Snape of the books and in Rickman, because he looks so strange to them, looming with that long dark hair, his terrifying gaze, in his long bat-like garb.
Fuel for an 11-year old’s bad dreams.
Put all that negativity on the strange appearance of a (very young-looking) Black Snape and we are almost in the antebellum South.

However.......

Despite black actors being given the role of white fictional (and white real life people,) you will never EVER see a white person playing a real life person who was black. Or even a fictional character who was black in the original film/book/show/play etc.

Will. Never. Happen!

You think people are whining and moany about a black actor playing Snape?!

Just LOL. It's nothing compared to the uproar and furore that would erupt if they cast Leonardo DiCaprio as Nelson Mandela or Martin Luther King in a film... The bloody film would never get off the drawing board. The screaming rage if this happened would be heard from the fucking moon!

Hard disagree.

My kids are 9 and 10 and just 'discovering' Harry Potter. The first film came out 25 years ago - that's like saying because I was born in '85 I should have felt an affinity as a child with movies from 1970? I didn't.

Kids today are ready for, and want their own version. And the TV format will allow better storytelling.

It doesn't explicitly say he was though. We can assume he was based on the fact most people were but that's all.

I'm a huge fan of his.

I was a bit surprised by the casting though - not because of his race but more because he has such a lovely kind beautiful face. Agree with prior poster he would have made a great Lupin or Sirius Black. His eyes are so beautiful and expressive and he does vulnerability well. I just don't see him as a bad guy.

Regardless, he's an amazing actor and I'm sure he'll be incredible in the part. I never would have looked at Andrew Scott and thought 'phwoar, romantic lead' but he pulled it off in Fleabag. A great actor can embody a character and the casting process will have been thorough.

I agree with this. PE is a great actor but Snape's appearance was fully and repeatedly described in the books. I think he's too charismatic to play Snape as well.

I read the other day that Paapa Essiedu has received a great deal of online abuse, including death threats, since his casting was announced, which is extremely sad.

I'm looking forward to the new series. Lenny Rush will be interesting as Dobby; I wasn't sure about that at first, but then I remembered that he was poignant and sensitive in his role in A Woman of Substance.

The only thing I'm not looking forward to particularly is the inclusion of Peeves. He's a tiresome little tit who adds no value and poor humour to the books (especially in the last one, where he makes some glib little jape after the Battle of Hogwarts while we're all in bits over the deaths of Fred, Lupin, Tonks, et al). It was a shame that Rik Mayall was cut from the first film, but the character was absolutely no loss.

I thought it was an unusual choice and I’m still unsure about him, but it’s done. People just need to accept it, he’s been cast as Snape and it’s not going to be changed now. May as well see what he’s got to offer us, he might actually be good.

YABVU.

Snape is described in the books as specifically pale/sallow skinned. When you read a book you develop a mental picture of the characters. Totally changing the colour of a character is jarring.

Also, it’s going to totally change the dynamic of Snape being bullied. James, Sirius et al were certainly arseholes to Snape but the new series is basically turning them into racists.

Its ridiculous casting.

Hm I can see Paapa doing Snape tbh, he's got range and can bring that dark présence

Well 1. There are VASTLY more white characters in those things. If you white washed the only black person then yeah there'd be uproar. If you took a book that had one black person and loads of white people and just assigned good actors no matter their skin colour there wouldn't be an issue if the one black person was white but the rest of the cast were diverse.

1. I absolutely have seen that. A book I love, the girl with all the gifts, is supposed to have a white child and a black teacher, the film or series, can't remember, switched them. No issues. And the RDJ film where he's in full blackface. Although I don't know if that caused complaints TBF.

We have to move TOWARDS equality, so it feels like things are being taken away from you, but that's because it wasn't equal. Like how men feel about feminism. And science shows that we do expect an advantage to continue and consider it unfair when that advantage is reduced, even if not to the point of true fairness.

You don't get to sit there and say black people have more rights when they've been the victims of generations and generations of having little to no rights. Just like men don't get to complain we have more rights because we're getting more rights than we did have.

And the fact that most of our TV and film are sill produced by white people, for white people, in countries with a higher percentage of white people means they're ABOUT white people if we invested more diversely your have more diversity.

In your opinion only it seems.

I haven’t read the books so cannot comment on the difference in casting but I agree with you there seems to be a weird degree of outrage when fictional characters are made black.

If people protest all differences with the book then so be it. Does anybody know if JKR has a massive issue with the casting?
I don’t get why people whine instead of simply not watching.

I have seen colour casting choices that make no sense to me but I get on with my life.

Well that’s clearly not true. Marianne Pearlman (wife of the slain journalist Daniel Pearlman) is black / white birracial and she was played by Angelina Jolie. And even leaving aside “black” white actors routinely played Middle Eastern / Egyptians in old Hollywood.

But the reason why race swap casting is so rare the other way is because typically “whiteness” (alongside “maleness”) are made the default or neutral. Whereas a lot of “black” roles are based around race. A film where Mandela or Malcolm X are played by white actors literally makes no sense. Like having Emmeline Pankhurst played by a man.

I have less of a problem with Snape than I do the female lead. The bullying doesn’t have to be about racism. It’s strange that a white person can be bullied for any number of qualities but a black person can only be bullied for being black. That thinking to me is racist.

It does bug me that the female lead is always race swapped though. Never the male lead obviously, they are far too important. It happens in everything now.

No, the idea that Rickman made Snape too sympathetic is a pretty common one.

but I would also prefer it if peasants weren't clean! Seeing actors with long flowing uncovered hair, and gleaming white hollywood teeth ALSO annoys me.

But I think you're being nonsensical to equate race with people not being washed (not to mention completely wrong, people absolutely DID wash!). Not washing isn't something that people have suffered centuries of systematic oppression over! It's ridiculous to pretend that a black person in 1800s Bath would have had exactly the same opportunities and experiences as a white one, or a man the same as a woman, or an aristocrat the same as a beggar.

If realism isn't at least vaguely important why do they bother putting actors in period costumes rather than just wearing jeans? Why use appropriate props and keep plot devices like lost letters rather than them all just texting each other? Why bother filming them in historic locations rather than on the side of the M25?

There are already young people who don't believe/understand how bad racism/sexism etc was not that long ago, because all tv and films they consume have black/asian people treated without any discrimination and women being allowed to be sexually flirtatious, spirited etc with no social consequences. Then they hanker back for those times because they only see the good sides and not the bad. It's really dangerous. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it, etc.

Have you been living under a rock for the last couple of decades? 'white washing' has been a problem for as long as film has existed. Just off the top my head..

Most of the cast of the first 'avatar the last air bender' film.

The wise old master in Dr strange (race and gender swapped)

Johnny Depp as tonto in the lone ranger

Christian bale as moses

Scarlet Johansson in ghost in the shell.

The Jake Gyllenhall as the Prince of Persia. (Lots of questionable casting in that film)