Roberto Cabigao

English 113B

Prof. Lawson

April 12, 2017

The Argument Proposal

My research question is on how does not having a race specific media affect job opportunities for

African American actors. Meaning that, while most people say that Latino actors are the ones

who struggle in the movie and entertainment industry due to the racial gap. African Americans

are impacted greatly due to them having to intertwine with white actors as they dont have their

own media outlet. Latinos have their own news outlet, their own shows with many networks.

African Americans have one channel BET (Black Entertainment Television) forcing African

American actors to co-host with white actors on a white dominant show.

One claim that I have discovered is that, in the article Academy Nominates All White Actors for

Second Year In a Row written by, Tim Gary the last two years all the academy nominations

have been all while actors. When in fact, there have been amazing movies with black leads that

has made the same amount of money and same reviews as the movie with white actors. The

movie Straight Out of Compton has been known to have the highest grossing (profit) movie of an

African American director. Regardless, none of the actors in the movie so much had gotten a

nomination. The question about these claims would be whether these movies would deserve a

nomination.
Also, what about the other races that are also being profiled for not being white and being looked

down upon on in the movie industry. An article written in the Washington Post, Hollywoods

race problem: An insular industry struggles to change written by, Cecilia Kang, Krissah

Thompson and Drew Harwell. Talk about how Hollywood has a huge problem with shifting the

way they run things. In a way that, they dont think that the people are ready for the, cultural

and racial shifts (Kang). Most directors shy away when it comes to trying something different.

This is because they believe that if whatever works now works. And it gives them profit by the

end of the show or movie then why change it. They think that by adding more and more African

American dominant movies they might end up flopping and not be able to bounce back from it.

The problem or questions that may arise from these claims are that, Latinos are actually more

underappreciated compared to blacks. That, there are actually more black directors compared to

Latinos. While all these claims may be true, Hollywood is the one with the problem of making

most of the movies and T.V shows predominantly white. Rather than having someone speak out

for the minority, they think that by having someone from the majority would accomplish the

same exact thing. Chandrain Nair is a writer for the Huffington post and he states that, Studios

are scared to greenlight a major film, even one for global audiences, that does not star a white

actor with an American accent. They consistently cast white actors to play non-white roles, such

as Prince Faisal, Ramses II and now even Michael Jackson (Nair 2). The studios would rather

hire a white actor to play a non-white actors role makes no sense.

May claim talks about how African Americans seem to struggle to get networks where blacks are

the main characters. Where other black can tune in to the network and know that their favorite

shows that they can relate too are being played. Most African Americans grew up in America and

there isnt any news outlet for needing African American news actors. Also since they are being
placed in a white world, they are forced to give in and work alongside white actors who are the

face of the show. Giving African Americans a harder time as they need to intermix with T.V

networks

Other people will mostly doubt about how African Americans have it harder for themselves when

it comes to being placed in the entertainment industry. That there are many other races who have

the same struggle and if not more. However, thats not what Im trying to argue. Im trying to

bring awareness that Hollywood has shifted from the old-school black family T.V shows such as:

Family Matter, Bernie Mac Show, Everybody Hates Chris, Fresh Prince of Bel Air. And once this

shift had taken placed, it really gave black actors and actress a harder time to find new shows to

work on. There isnt a huge selection of networks for blacks (BET) compared to Latino:

Telemundo, UniMas, NTN24 and so much more.

Kang, Cecilia, Krissah Thompson, and Drew Harwell. "Hollywood's Race Problem: An Insular

Industry Struggles to Change." The Washington Post. WP Company, 23 Dec. 2014. Web. 12 Apr.

2017.

Gray, Tim. "Academy Nominates All White Actors for Second Year in Row." Variety.

Washington Post, 19 Jan. 2016. Web. 12 Apr. 2017.

Nair, Chandran. "Hollywood's Problem Isn't Just Black and White -- It's a Lack of Global

Voices." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 29 Feb. 2016. Web. 12 Apr. 2017.