It’s Not Easy Being Brown
Now on YouTube: Planet of the Arabs, an official selection of the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.
Being an Arab American actor, or any actor that looks Arab has got to be one of the toughest things to be right now. Ask Aasif Mandvi, a frequent contributor on The A Daily Show. The guy’s Indian, but I’ve seen him play characters named Abdul, Hassan, etc.. And on the flip side: “Engineering Student” and “Indian Guy”.
Imagine writing the phrase INDIAN GUY in a script. Clearly, you would only do that to set up INDIAN JOKE. Sign #1 that you are a goddamned hack.
Anyway, Planet of the Arabs is apparently inspired by a book titled Reel Bad Arabs: “Out of 1000 films that have Arab & Muslim characters (from the year 1896 to 2000) 12 were positive depictions, 52 were even handed and the rest of the 900 were negative.” Holy crap.
My Work in Print
Year Zero
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Cowboy Versus Samurai
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