“I love embarking on new journeys, I love the excitement of new projects, the thrill of bringing new stories to life,” Gadot wrote.
Monday, October 12, 2020
Gal Gadot to star as Cleopatra, sparking dispute over Israeli in role
“I love embarking on new journeys, I love the excitement of new projects, the thrill of bringing new stories to life,” Gadot wrote.
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I have to disagree here, I think that Gal Gadot should not have this role if we are following the principle of accurate and culturally sensitive casting that we have today. I think that this role would be much more suited for an actor that is from that region and represents that leader. I think that Middle Eastern visibility in entertainment has been a point of conversation in the past couple of years and is becoming more and more important to companies to properly tell those stories. I understand that Cleopatra is history that is highly interpreted, but I think that the current interpretation of the character needs to meet the moment, especially in Hollywood. I think that its about time that we lift up Egyptian, other Middle Eastern actors, and Isreali actors- but I think that in order to achieve that type of representation we have to start looking at the details and making sure that they are respected no matter how difficult the conversation might be.
I think this article hints at a larger problem in Hollywood. Used as a reason why Paramount might want to cast Gal Gadot over someone who is from North Africa, the article cites that Gal Gadot is a name and the studio would never want to cast an unknown. The word “unknown” seems to be used interchangeably with “African” in this context, which is both troubling and goes unacknowledged by the article. While it is true that there are a distinct lack of African voices in Hollywood, this isn’t something to be proud of. It’s not something to cite as a reason why Gal Gadot deserves a role. It’s exactly the reason it should be filled by someone else. But even setting all this aside, Gadot isn’t Greek. The article tried to argue that Gadot is justified in playing Cleopatra because while she ruled Egypt, she herself was Greek. This argument would be valid if Gadot herself was Greek, but it’s not. This is just irrelevant to the article. This was a bit of a frustrating read, but I can see by reading Shahzad’s comment I am not the only one that feel that way.
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