racial tonality judgment call

[beardedlamb]

i was looking at old stuff i've written in my blog. i know, riveting. anyway, since the theory forum is running light lately, i thought i would offer up this little racial cunundrum and see what people have to say about it.


I was in my second city class and a three person scene was happening. the actors were a white guy on the left, a black lady in the middle, and i don’t even remember who was on the left. anyway, the lady in the middle had played in a couple scenes before and in each one she had played a stereotypical black female character. although done very well, it seems her range is not what her potential would indicate.
the “assignment” for the scene was to have three objects in your personal space picked before the scene starts (mimed of course.) this helps to define your character and put you at ease as to who you are on stage in that particular scene. so the scene starts and they have their objects. dialogue occurs and the african-am. lady makes reference to two of her objects, a crock pot and a fry daddy, all in another stereotypical black accent. she talks about how she just loves her fried foods, etc. etc.
so there’s a lull in the scene and the white actor turns to her and says, “do you have any chitlins over there?”
the whole room takes a collective breath in and everything freezes. i crane my head around the room to see everyone’s reactions. some of them are just normally countenanced but a few of them make “holy jeez” faces at each other. i know i was making a holy jeezer myself. i look back on stage to see what everyone’s next move is. The actor, I think noticing his slip-up, says after a brief pause, “Because you’re a southern cook and all.” a gallant save.

My question is: Is this a racist joke?

And here are both sides of the issue as far as I can tell:
Yes, it’s racist for him to assume that all black people would have chitlins on them and its inappropriate to make light of stereotypes in an improv scene for the sake of a laugh (which never came by the way.)

However, if she’s going to come at you ‘all black’ isn’t it part of the improviser’s job to express what everyone is thinking be it subconscious or not? And, isn’t he helping to define her character by continuing on the path that she began, i.e. a stereotypical southern black cook.

And how would things have been different had both of these actors been black? I don’t know which side I choose. It’s one of those situations that has me crossed. When social morays do battle with improv rules i get lost. I abstain and not for political reasons. I’m truly undecided and it bothers me that I can’t say wholeheartedly that his comment was wrong. I just don’t know.

[arthursimone]

the whole room takes a collective breath in and everything freezes.

What was the racial makeup of the room?
It all depends on the viewpoint of the performer in relation to the viewpoint of the audience. Was the dude going for a cheap laugh? Was she going for cheap laughs? Was he speaking for the audience or for his buddies in the audience? Had she been milking the stereotypical laughs and using them as a crutch?

Racism (or any -ism) in comedy is and always will be subjective and dependent on a slew of situational criteria. That's the only rule I can ever really believe in.

[mpbrockman]

... isn’t it part of the improviser’s job to express what everyone is thinking be it subconscious or not? And, isn’t he helping to define her character by continuing on the path that she began, i.e. a stereotypical southern black cook.

It's a character, for goodness' sake. Maybe the character is racist. So be it. Hopefully the audience grasps the distinction between performer and character!

Personally, I think anytime you start walking on eggshells and second-guessing yourself (am I conforming to popular sensibilities?) you're diminishing your performance, writing, whatever...

[KathyRose]

uh .... what "slip-up"? Seems like a reasonable extrapolation of the scenario that she had set up herself. Perhaps not the most original choice he could have made, but the only "error" that I see was the player's waffling over his choice (based on the room's reaction) instead of committing himself to it and pushing it further.

You can't always tell what will make an audience cringe, groan or grimace. If an improviser has to continually censor his thoughts, words and actions, then he cannot be free to follow the creative impulse.

Since he didn't START the scene with a stereotypical or derogatory comment, I would assume that he WAS "helping to define her character by continuing on the path that she began." Or that he just had a sudden craving for chitlins. Either way, I'd say - no harm, no foul. Continue play.

What was HER reaction?

[kbadr]

I've thought about this quite a bit in the past. I think it's very easy to jump to conclusions and declare racism.

Yes, it’s racist for him to assume that all black people would have chitlins

...but I would argue that it's not racist at all to have a single black character who would have chitlins, or an Indian whose parents want him to be a doctor, or a Englishman who has terrible teeth, or whatever based-in-some-measure-of-reality stereotype that political correctness has taught us to write off entirely as ignorance. If it becomes a pattern, and this player only plays the stereotypes, yeah, it's shallow and boring. Maybe even racist and ignorant.

I am personally just as offended and tired of the more common stereotype of southern accents being equivalent to stupidity on stage. It's just poor acting and uncreative. I'm sure I'm as guilty of it as everyone else, but it doesn't mean I have to like it.

Here's the thing I've realized. The only time this comes up is when we play the stereotype. Why? because, unless we say, "as a black man" or "as a woman", the audience isn't going to immediately think or assume that you are portraying a race/gender different than your own if you are doing it subtly (ie, acting well). I'm not justifying playing stereotypes, but I'm saying that this issue only comes up when a stereotype is played, because when it isn't, we often don't even realize that an improviser is playing a different race. Unless it becomes a plot point in a scene/show. I don't know that this is a bad thing. It's an interesting observation.

[KathyRose]

I am personally just as offended and tired of the more common stereotype of southern accents being equivalent to stupidity on stage.

Suh, I share your despisement of ignorance. There is a great deal of difference between Southern (a la "Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil") and Redneck/Bubba stereotypes. I'm rather fond of the intelligent & scheming Southerners, as well as their more humble cousins who may appear to be simple-minded, but are endowed with folk-wisdom.

[mcnichol]

this stuff is always weird. i lean towards your second thought, that he was just "helping to define her character by continuing on the path that she began." but it seems like lazy and predictable move to ask about chitlins, playing into that stereotype. why not make it more interesting AND avoid any potential race weirdness? he could have easily asked her for grey poupon or something just to endow her with that attribute, rather than something ordinary. or take these scene away from her attributes and to some causal thing -- he's a fit friend talking about how all of the fried food has her looking horrible and all out of breath. Or anything else besides chitlins.

i think there are some people -- and this is especially in classes, where people first realize they can really say anything up there -- that enjoy exploring ethically shitty areas of human relations in scenes. i remember teaching a guy here in austin who had scenes...
-where he wouldn't do something for the other character because she was Jewish, was Black, was gay... etc.
-where he murdered babies or something or other
-where other shitty things the worst people do happened

i don't know if it was his subconscious finally coming out, nervousness in the improvising that led to what he wasn't supposed to say, or just bad verbal luck. or the short burst of attention you get from shock value.

regardless i don't really think it's ok in the grand scheme of things, since we are all smarter and better improvisors than that, and can come up with far more intestering things to say as characters and as improvisors.

rule of thumb: i personally only improvise with white irish men to avoid these kinds of sticky issues.

[Maggie Maye]

First of all, I take issue with your use of the term “all black.” Seriously, what the hell is that supposed to mean? Whether you meant it or not, terms like that insinuate all black people act a certain way. And, further, what do you mean by a “stereotypically” black accent? Is it the young black urbanite from Brooklyn? Is it a Creole from Louisiana? Someone from Mississippi? A kid from Compton? A black man from Kenya? From South Africa? From London? These accents are regional and all different sounding. The phrase “acting black” is NOT a catch all.

Second, I don’t understand how you’d assume she was being stereotypically black. Maybe she was playing a character that is from the south (maybe stereotypically so). In case you haven’t noticed, a southern accent basically sounds the same, regardless of their race of the speaker (but differs by region). And characteristically, they like fatty and fried food (one of the noted reasons why these regions tend to have overweight populations). Additionally, in my experience, when people are told to make a character choice, a lot of people adopt a southern accent. So, just because she happens to be black and uses a southern accent doesn’t mean she’s trying to be “all black.”

To address the question, I don’t really consider the joke to be racist. A lot of southern people eat chitlins, not just blacks. However, what would race matter in the scene anyway? If she’s a black southern cook or a white southern cook, how would making a racial stereotype help enhance the scene? How does saying something stereotypical somehow “express what everyone is thinking”? I don’t see why someone would realistically do this in a scene unless the character was racist or was prone to assumptions.

Despite what you may think from what I’ve written, I don’t have a problem with race or it being used in improv (if used to enhance a scene). I do, however, have a problem with people throwing around terms and making assumptions.

[TexasImprovMassacre]

lamb, you're so racist