Basque-heritage Elordi deemed insufficiently swarthy to play Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights

The character is now understood to be heterosexual also

Source material considerations aside, there have been so many WH adaptations with white guys at this point – 2011 with Kaya Scodelario had a black one – I don't understand why do it yet again when there so many hot papis in Hollywood to choose from. Or maybe go with Dev Patel, he's hot as hell. Is it all about the money, i.e. box office draw?

Swarthy? He's as swarthy as Laurence Olivier was. This is nonsensical.

[quote]Is it all about the money, i.e. box office draw?

Yes, you tard.

r4 = OP = rude little turd who is now blocked to me (again)

I think R4 is Emerald Fennell!

R5 lol

Unless he dances the title song from Kate Bush in the nude, I too have difficulty finding the interest of yet another adaptation. That said, the reason for the protest is beyond ridiculous…

He sho is ugly.

So they can turn Anne Boleyn, a real person, black, but they can’t do this?

Romani is white.

Nonsense

Tempest in a tea pot

he sure is hard to look at.

Imagine this headline: White people outraged that Audra McDonald will be playing Rose in Gypsy.

The character also was known to have a great ass after all that clambering about, and Elordylordy infamously has an ass like two deflated baby volley balls.

THIS is a Heathcliff.

The imbeciles participating in this campaign are showing their glaring ignorance by clamouring with misguided outrage from the rooftops, about something of which they don't know anything at all. Romani people are some of the most racially diverse ethnic groups there are, with some being quite dark (think about their origins in the Indian subcontinent), while others are blond and blue-eyed. Many of them will be undistinguishable from any other European person, as they are heavily mixed with the local populations of the countries where they've lived most of their lives. Also, Roma people have mixed with, and occasionally become integrated into, other European nomadic ethnic groups such as Irish Travellers, Spanish Mercheros, Central European Yenish and Balkanian Sarakatsani and Aromanians. Thus, it's possible to find Gypsies who have an extremely varied cultural, linguistic, ethnic and racial background.

I am always shocked at how unintelligent, uncurious and uneducated some of the most "progressive" people are - in fact, were it not for the fact of their professed ideology, they would be virtually undistinguishable form the illiterate, narrow-minded, recalcitrantly ignorant Conservative hillbillies they claim to despise. In all seriousness, they're the sort of idiots who think that the term 'Black Irish' is proof that Irish people are historically black. 🙄

[quote] The character is now understood to be mixed-race or Romani,

What are you talking about: "now understood"??? And r17, whether Romani people can be blond or not, in the original novel Heathcliff is repeatedly called dark and swarthy.

Throughout the original 1847 Emily Brontë novel people repeatedly refer to his dark complexion and hair, and ask if he's "Gypsy" (Romani) or "Lascar" (i.e. from South Asia). That's in the original source material.

[quote] Swarthy? He's as swarthy as Laurence Olivier was. This is nonsensical.

Laurence Oliver also played Othello on film--in blackface.

By your reasoning, then, since Laurence Olivier set the precedent, it's therefore fine for all future Othellos to be white men in blackface.

I think they have a point. There are so few characters of color in classic western literature, that to whitewash such characters is a kind of erasure.

[quote] I am always shocked at how unintelligent, uncurious and uneducated some of the most "progressive" people are

And yet here you yourself yammer on and on about this, and yet you have clearly not read or at least do not remember the actual text of the novel this is based on, which contradicts exactly what you've said.

Try to check your actual sources next time, instead of slamming other people in self-congratulatory ignorance.

Lascar referred to Asiatic sailors and included Arabs and Indians.

Liverpool was an important maritime city. So, probably intended to be the offspring of a Lascarian sailor and Liverpuddian whore.

Still, it’s not like they actually SAID he was.

Multiple characters in the novel--Edgar's and Isabella's father Mr. Linton, Hindley, Nelly, and Heathcliff himself--repeatedly make note of the fact that he looks non-white because he is so dark and swarthy, and repeatedly speculate if he is not white.

Of course if they did cast a darker-skinned actor, they’d face a backlash for being woke.

These are the current rules:

Only Blacks can portray Blacks.

Only Hispanics can portray Hispanics.

Only Asians can portray Asians.

Only gays can portray gays.

Only disabled people can portray disabled people.

Anybody can portray whites.

Got it?

[quote] Imagine this headline: White people outraged that Audra McDonald will be playing Rose in Gypsy.

Does Heathcliff sing in "Wuthering Heights"?! If he does, I would prefer he be played by Audra McDonald.

Wouldn’t 19th century English country folk consider Basques “swarthy”?

Jacob plays Sojourner Truth next!

Jacob Elordi IS Harriet Tubman!

Except all bets are off in opera, r25.

I don't understand all the excitement about him, just don't get it

Jacob has a lovely arse R15

Jacob drops out and issues an apology in 3.....2......1.

R14 You are talking about color blind casting which is a beautiful thing. However they don’t do color blind casting of works where race is a central theme of the story or character. I still want it to be him because I love him.

[quote] Jacob has a lovely arse

Eets flat like a pancake.

FWIW, Olivier’s blackface Othello was considered distracting, out-of-date and tacky by the time the 60s rolled around.

I don't think he's all that attractive. in no way classically handsome. I find him odd looking.

Completely agree, R37.

So non-white actors can play ANY race, but white actors can only play white. Got it. Fair to me.

In fairness, Olivier's Othello lost a lot when they cut the Old Man River sequence. It was avante garde for the time and, my God, the way he used his falsetto.

r16 damn right. I watch that version of WH every Christmas with Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley (who fell in love and later married/are still married) and it makes me tear up every time.

I count myself among those who think he is gorgeous, but he's gotten so skinny in the last year that he's not as attractive to me. I am assuming the coke habit has spiraled out of control as it always does.

Heathcliff wasn’t black. Emily Bronte died in 1848 and probably never left Bumfuck, England in her lifetime. I doubt that when she described Heathcliff as having dark skin that she was implying he was some sort of transplant from Nairobi. A white Spaniard would be dark-skinned to her.

R34 The only works where race is a central theme of the story or character are works about POC. Which is why color blind casting only benefits POC actors.

OP got lost on the way to a MAGA rally

[quote] So non-white actors can play ANY race, but white actors can only play white. Got it. Fair to me

Oh Shut the fuck up R39 you're such a whiney little whore. You also don't know how to do any fucking research.

r43 what a fucking retard. No said anything about Heathcliff being black.

R42 I sure hope not. If only I could talk to him personally and get him to just leave that stuff alone. You can never be a functioning coke user.