I hope they cast a genuine mixed-race actress rather than a WASP English actress as Madeline, they don't portray all the blondes as angelic goodies, and they don't cast Jewish actors and actresses as the baddies.
This is the type of casting nonsense I'd expect from the Third Reich, not from 1980s Hollywood.
But Madeline doesn't look mixed race. Nobody would have known she was based on looks alone. So it wouldn't make sense to cast someone who is obviously of African descent, because it was a big secret in the book.
I think they should cast Phoebe Tonkin for Madeline. She's beautiful and she looks like a young LAD to me. She's got an exotic look so she could pull it off.
Well Brett isn't supposed to be a blonde, I think she's just supposed to be a plainer version of Ashton. I think the directors wanted an actress to contrast Ashton rather than just looking like a plain version of her, and Genie Francis was a well known soap star, so she was a good casting choice as far as bringing in her fans as viewers. Constance is supposed to be a red head. Willa is supposed to be a blonde, and they cast a brunette. I highly doubt it was intentional to make blondes seem like angels. That's not even the way it is seen in today's world anyway. In the old days of Hollywood, brunettes like Theda Bara were the "vamps" and blondes were the good girls. But Jean Harlow turned that around in the '30's with her platinum blonde hair and playing the vixen, and since then blondes have been seen as the sexy, "mean" girls and brunettes are considered the plain girls, for the most part.
I'm not sure what you mean about Jewish actors. I don't care about their real life ethnicity as long as they play the part well. Are you referring to Terri Garber and Philip Casnoff? I do know Terri said she's Jewish, I don't know about Philip but I have heard he is part Jewish. In any case, Terri fit the part of the Ashton with the black hair and very dark eyes, I could care less that she's Jewish.
I don't think any Jewish actor would reject playing a role like Ashton or Bent because it is somehow racist when neither character is Jewish. There was nothing racist about the casting. Philip was cast because the directors were impressed with his audition.
Btw, I wouldn't have even known Terri's ethnicity if she hadn't said it in an interview. And I certainly don't think they should deny a Jewish actor or actress to play a part they are right for just because of their ethnicity. To me all that should matter is who fits the part the best.
Also, there aren't a lot of blondes in the N&S books to begin with. George I think was a blonde, and look, they cast a dark haired actor to play a hero.
It's also Jakes who chose to make Ashton the black haired villainess, at least in N&S he seems to see the dark haired women as more physically desirable than lighter haired. Not just with Ashton and Madeline, but in the creepy prologue with Ashton's ancestor cheating on his blonde wife with a slutty Cherokee Indian girl and siring the Main's that way. (And no I am not calling the girl a slut because she's a Cherokee, I'm calling her that because of her actions, and if Ashton were real I'd say we can trace her sociopathic and nympho characteristics right back to these characters).
But Madeline doesn't look mixed race. Nobody would have known she was based on looks alone. So it wouldn't make sense to cast someone who is obviously of African descent, because it was a big secret in the book.Maybe not an obviously mixed-race actress then, but certainly an actress who looks less typically WASP/English than Lesley-Anne Down. One contemporary review even hilariously suggested that Patrick Swayze looked more black/ethnic than she did.
I think they should cast Phoebe Tonkin for Madeline. She's beautiful and she looks like a young LAD to me. She's got an exotic look so she could pull it off.
Well Brett isn't supposed to be a blonde, I think she's just supposed to be a plainer version of Ashton. I think the directors wanted an actress to contrast Ashton rather than just looking like a plain version of her, and Genie Francis was a well known soap star, so she was a good casting choice as far as bringing in her fans as viewers.Funnily enough Genie Francis is better-looking than Terri Garber so it's ironic if Francis was cast as the 'plain sister'.
In the old days of Hollywood, brunettes like Theda Bara were the "vamps" and blondes were the good girls. But Jean Harlow turned that around in the '30's with her platinum blonde hair and playing the vixen, and since then blondes have been seen as the sexy, "mean" girls and brunettes are considered the plain girls, for the most part.Thank goodness for Jean Harlow then. I do know red hair used to be associated with evil. That strikes me as partially racist since red hair tends to be dominant among Celts. And the idea of dark hair representing evil and blonde hair representing good/angelic qualities, which you are correct as identifying as a historical tradition, is also racist since dark hair and the genes that produce it will be considered less 'pure' than blonde hair, a recessive phenotype that is increasingly rare among the population and primarily found among Anglo-Saxons.
I'm not sure what you mean about Jewish actors. I don't care about their real life ethnicity as long as they play the part well. Are you referring to Terri Garber and Philip Casnoff? I do know Terri said she's Jewish, I don't know about Philip but I have heard he is part Jewish. In any case, Terri fit the part of the Ashton with the black hair and very dark eyes, I could care less that she's Jewish.I only guessed that these two actors, who played the adaptation's nominal villains, were Jewish since 'Garber' and 'Casnoff' are typically, although not exclusively, Jewish surnames.
I don't think LAD is really that WASP looking though. She has dark hair, and she has slanty eyes a little bit and not a really cookie cutter button nose. So I really don't have a problem with this casting. They could cast a mixed race actress, but it will have to be one that doesn't appear to have African ancestry because Madeline doesn't have a lot, but even a little in those days was enough for her to be shunned by the people she was with.
As for the Jewish issue. I really can't imagine that it's the intention of movie producers to put a bad view of Jews into the movies. Honestly, Hollywood and show business in general has a large Jewish population.
And as far as N&S, it's Jakes who wrote that Ashton had black hair and eyes. Terri fit that look and I thought was pretty impressive in the role. I get the feeling she really enjoyed playing it, too. Actors love playing villains, that's more fun for them than playing good characters. And it would have been racist to deny Terri the part because she's Jewish and Ashton is not. It wouldn't be worth it for a Jewish actor to turn down a good role just because of some "image" it might be portraying. I don't even care what the race or religion of an actor is, as long as they play their part good, that's all I care about and I think most people are the same. See, I wouldn't have known the names Casnoff and Garber are Jewish, and it just doesn't matter to me.
Bent in the book was a fat guy with black eyes and hair. Again, this is Jakes' writing. The other character the movie Bent is based on, also had dark hair. So really, could they have changed it up and made Genie Francis play Ashton and Garber play Brett? They could, but then they'd have really changed the looks of Ashton and Brett, because even though Brett isn't a blonde, I don't think she's as dark as Terri.
I'm not really sure what you mean about what I said about Terri.
Anyway, no offense but I just think you're taking this too seriously. I don't think race should figure into casting unless it is really important to the character. In this case, Ashton is gentile and Terri is not but she can pass for it, so I see no reason why she shouldn't be cast as Ashton.
Brad Pitt has played bad boy types. His characters in Legends Of The Fall and A River Runs Through It were both troubled men who were hardly traditional heroes.
All that being said, I wish they wouldn't make a remake. I like the old movies, I never like remakes much and if we're going to get into race issues, the way things are going, I think it's a bad idea to push this on this generation. I can see the racists now, holding Ashton up as their poster girl. The world was different in the '80's, we didn't have social media and cases like Freddy Gray (I live in Baltimore where that happened) and I just think it's better left alone.
But the bottom line in Hollywood is money, not really art, or social issues.
And yes, thank God for Jean Harlow. She was adorable.😃
That you for your measured and reasonable response to my, slightly controversial, comments. 
I don't strongly disagree with most of what you state, although I do wish Genie Francis had been cast as the 'bad sister', and am I curious as to what she would have done with the part, and wish Terri Garber had played the nicer sister regardless of hair colour.
And I'm not sure if I agree that LAD has 'slanty eyes' or a prominent nose. Plus dark hair alone is hardly an indicator of ethnicity. However, I suppose LAD has got fairly high cheekbones which does give her a slightly more ethnic look than someone with a fuller face.
You're welcome. :)
It would be interesting to think about Genie as the bad girl and Terri the good girl. I think they liked Terri for Ashton because in addition to the coloring, they thought of Ashton as another Scarlett O'Hara and they think Terri looks like Vivien Leigh (the producers I mean, I read this in old articles).
I do think LAD made a very effective Madeline, whether she looked exactly the part or not. I think all the actors did a good job even if they didn't fit their book counterparts to a T.
And what's interesting about remakes that follow a book exactly, I've seen two and neither was as good as their first movie that didn't follow as close. These movies are The Shining and Children of the Corn.
So, even if they do a remake exactly like the book, we can't guarantee it will be better than this one, which was a really good production for it's time.
Like I said, my personal hope is the remake never comes about.
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In "Queen", Alex Haley's story of his grandmother, Halle Berry was cast as the eponymous bi-racial heroine. Now, I think Halle Berri is quite beautiful. However, do I think she could "pass" when she travels to the post-Civil War north? Certainly not, and, that annoyed me to the extent that it's about the only thing I remember from watching this, admittedly mediocre, mini-series.
So, it's no use simply casting "a genuine mixed race actress" as Madeline, unless she looks the part like, say, Jennifer Beals would have.
The character is only 1/8 African. By the fourth generation there might not be any visible signs of that genetic heritage at all.
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