What do you think of the sudden trend of revisionist period pieces casting people of color as historically white people?

The desperate shoehorning in of black people into European history comes across as needy virtue signalling by middle class producers eager to show they are politically correct whilst knowingly lying and misrepresenting history in favour of a pretend historic diversity.

African history and mythology seems to be perceived by producers as lacking and uninteresting compared to European history, which is a shame, I’d love to see another version of Shaka Zulu for example, but instead they cast a black actress as Anne Boelyn in yet another tale about the Tudors. 🙄

Well, it has worked before I have to admit. In the book Forrest Gump, Bubba was white but in the movie he was changed to African American. Another example is Shawshank Redemption. In the book Red was white but Morgan Freeman was cast and he gave an amazing performance. I admit though I didn't like it though in the show Once Upon a time where not only is Sir Lancelot cast as an African American but Merlin is too and drastically changed to be some young guy in his 20s instead of old like he always was. Then again King Arthur sucked in that show for wanting to kill all the main characters.

No hard and fast rules, there are exceptions to everything. But my take on it is this.

It depends. If it's done for reasons of virtue signaling -- and when that happens it usually *is* glaringly obvious -- then no. Might be a good story, but the woke stench ruins it.

That's probably *the* single most important thing, IMO. And I'll add that it's nothing new. Hollywood has always had people who think just because they can spin good yarns they have important moral lessons to convey and presume to lecture the rest of us. And they've always been clumsy at it, thus the stench. This stuff is just the latest flavor of that horsecrap.

If it's a fictional character but using the non-White actor violates the historical context, no. If the movie is set in WW1, the US military must be segregated and you can't have Blacks and Whites serving together.

If the character is a real historical person, then absolutely not. There's a duty of truth owed to real persons, even if they're dead.

If it's a legendary character, questionable but possible. If you want to cast Denzel Washington as Hamlet or Macbeth, go for it. I really wouldn't give a shit. But understand, that is cultural appropriation. If you do that, let's hear no complaints from you if someone remakes Roots and casts an Asian or White as Kunta Kinte.[*]

If it introduces, alters, or eliminates a racial element in the work, probably not. (Of course, always will to some degree.) There's no reason you couldn't do Death Of A Salesman with Don Cheadle as Willy Loman. But if you do, Linda Loman should be Black too. Otherwise you're introducing an element (mixed marriage) not present in the original work.

The exception to all of the above is if the casting is done for reasons of satire, parody, etc. I can only imagine a remake of Mandingo with all of the characters race-swapped; all Black roles played by Whites and vice versa.

[*] To be clear, Alex Haley was no William Shakespeare, and I'm not implying that he was.

I wouldn't mind a black Pinocchio.

Bad goy

Don't you know that noticing things is racist, goy?

It's disgusting double standards. If you're not allowed to play a gay or trans person unless you are, then I'll kindly ask that black people do not play white characters/historical figures.

It's like Ariel is going to be black in the new Little Mermaid. Why???

I read that Hamilton's mother was half black and he was passing for white. A very common practice in those days.

Most people don't know history. An excellent start is "The Black Tudors" about black people in Europe during the time of King Henry VIII.
https://www.amazon.com/Black-Tudors-Untold-Miranda-Kaufmann/dp/1786071843

It's part of a fairly brazen agenda by a certain group of people.

Some might say six million.

They say it's all just 'colorblind casting' but if they cast Ryan Gosling as Martin Luther King, buildings would be burnt down. There is a very clear anti-white agenda in every facet of media.