Hobbit Casting Agent Fired For Dismissing Non-White Hobbits

[Skratt]

As far as I am aware. The original books of J.R. Tolkien never had any colored hobbits. I don't think this is discrimination based on prejudice, rather, keeping to the original spirit of the novel. Naz Humphreys appears to be playing the race card, and it was easily predicted that she would do so. The ironic part of it is, that in by forcing your skin color into a fictional culture whereas such a provision was never made, is racist in itself. It does not respect the cultural heritage of the native hobbit. Maybe just ethnocentric?

How exactly can you determine the color of the skin of a Hobbit from a book? From what I remember, I have never read where it would indicate one way or the other. And why is it not perfectly acceptable to have a black dwarf or dark skinned Hobbit?

I've always found it amusing that the closer you are to good and light, the paler your skin and the closer to evil and darkness, the darker your skin. Obviously pigmentation works in reverse in the fantasy realm, or maybe it's just a kind of evolution - better to hide from beasties in the dark by being black? That's funny, I've always found it hard to discern colors in the dark...

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Hobbits are multi-ethnic or multi-racial. Take your pick (i.e., at least of various skin tones, ranging from "brown" to "fair").

I did read Tolkien, I just don't remember that particular description. I kind of assume that all races in all works of fiction have varying degrees of pigmentation, so my question was more directed at those in this thread that are saying that Hobbits are white, an opinion that I feel is more formed in their own perceptions than in reality. So thank you for having a fantastic memory (or a search-able ebook ) and confirming that for me.

 

[murphy7801]

Lord of the rings is supposed to be turn of the 20th century Birmingham (uk) country side there wasn't anyone of that colour at that time just due to lack of travel in rural areas which is the shires area. This ridiculous things don't have to have someone of another race to not make it racist just like if made a film about 10th century African cultures you wouldn't have any white people and no one would care.

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

as in tanned in a Spanish senses if you think of the cultural context for the period and place

 

[Cliff_m85]

I get the impression the agent has been fired to save PR. Hobbits are all white, simple as - its not a racist thing but a point of fact. I mean if you really wanted to start getting technical its all done to where they sit in middle earth, based on the weather conditions and so on. Its the same reason why you wouldnt see any black dwarfs or elfs either.

You're just like the man who told me I couldn't try out for the role of Martin Luther King Jr.

Racism! Why doth thou sting at me?!?

 

[Littlee300]

I can't imagine a black or indian (that includes mexican) hobbit as a main character that doesn't look out of place, maybe far in the background it would work.

 

[JDKJ]

Lord of the rings is supposed to be turn of the 20th century Birmingham (uk) country side there wasn't anyone of that colour at that time just due to lack of travel in rural areas which is the shires area. This ridiculous things don't have to have someone of another race to not make it racist just like if made a film about 10th century African cultures you wouldn't have any white people and no one would care.

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

as in tanned in a Spanish senses if you think of the cultural context for the period and place

If that's the case and to bring this whole shit-pot discussion full circle and back to where it started, then Naz Humphreys, a woman of Pakistani heritage, would seem to me an entirely suitable candidate to be cast in the role of a character "tanned in a Spanish sense." Your average Pakistani's "tanned."

 

[JDKJ]

As far as I am aware. The original books of J.R. Tolkien never had any colored hobbits. I don't think this is discrimination based on prejudice, rather, keeping to the original spirit of the novel. Naz Humphreys appears to be playing the race card, and it was easily predicted that she would do so. The ironic part of it is, that in by forcing your skin color into a fictional culture whereas such a provision was never made, is racist in itself. It does not respect the cultural heritage of the native hobbit. Maybe just ethnocentric?

How exactly can you determine the color of the skin of a Hobbit from a book? From what I remember, I have never read where it would indicate one way or the other. And why is it not perfectly acceptable to have a black dwarf or dark skinned Hobbit?

I've always found it amusing that the closer you are to good and light, the paler your skin and the closer to evil and darkness, the darker your skin. Obviously pigmentation works in reverse in the fantasy realm, or maybe it's just a kind of evolution - better to hide from beasties in the dark by being black? That's funny, I've always found it hard to discern colors in the dark...

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Hobbits are multi-ethnic or multi-racial. Take your pick (i.e., at least of various skin tones, ranging from "brown" to "fair").

I did read Tolkien, I just don't remember that particular description. I kind of assume that all races in all works of fiction have varying degrees of pigmentation, so my question was more directed at those in this thread that are saying that Hobbits are white, an opinion that I feel is more formed in their own perceptions than in reality. So thank you for having a fantastic memory (or a search-able ebook ) and confirming that for me.

I can't take any credit. A poster by the name of zala-taichou pointed us to the fact.

And I imagine that there are times when we need not assume the physical characteristics of a character in a work of fiction. For example, who knows what race the Seven Dwarfs were, but I think we can say with a comfortable degree of certainty that Snow White was -- how can I say this -- as white as snow.

 

[murphy7801]

Lord of the rings is supposed to be turn of the 20th century Birmingham (uk) country side there wasn't anyone of that colour at that time just due to lack of travel in rural areas which is the shires area. This ridiculous things don't have to have someone of another race to not make it racist just like if made a film about 10th century African cultures you wouldn't have any white people and no one would care.

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

as in tanned in a Spanish senses if you think of the cultural context for the period and place

If that's the case and to bring this whole shit-pot discussion full circle and back to where it started, then Naz Humphreys, a woman of Pakistani heritage, would seem to me an entirely suitable candidate to be cast in the role of a character "tanned in a Spanish sense." Your average Pakistani's "tanned."

wow one go to Spain not Mexico two that's incredibly ignorant of skin cast system of that region of the world.

 

[Wintermute_]

This is just bogus. I get that this could be misconstrued as racial profiling, but its god damn Hobbits! I hate to let every non-light skinned race out there know, but LOTR and The Hobbit where written in a sort of quasi Medieval european society... only with dwarves, elves, orks, and a medley of other crazy coolness, but not a lot of any other races of cultures beyond what Tolkien thought up.

The real problem is, if I'm gunna be watching The Hobbit, and suddenly a pakistani, black or Asian hobbit was on the screen, as a fan I would, sadly, completely loss any sense of immersion, and immediately think to myself, "whats the deal with that Asian hobbit?". The movie universe was just shattered.

Its not a matter of me being racist, I'd just suddenly realize I'm watching a movie and am in a theater and not Middle Earth.

Feel bad for the poor guy who lost his job over this, even if it was just so the company could save face.

... actually, wait, this whole situation is just ridiculous in general... what I just said is so troll worthy.

 

[JDKJ]

Lord of the rings is supposed to be turn of the 20th century Birmingham (uk) country side there wasn't anyone of that colour at that time just due to lack of travel in rural areas which is the shires area. This ridiculous things don't have to have someone of another race to not make it racist just like if made a film about 10th century African cultures you wouldn't have any white people and no one would care.

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

as in tanned in a Spanish senses if you think of the cultural context for the period and place

If that's the case and to bring this whole shit-pot discussion full circle and back to where it started, then Naz Humphreys, a woman of Pakistani heritage, would seem to me an entirely suitable candidate to be cast in the role of a character "tanned in a Spanish sense." Your average Pakistani's "tanned."

wow one go to Spain not Mexico two that's incredibly ignorant of skin cast system of that region of the world.

Not half as incredibly ignorant as saying that the Hobbits were white because the tale's set in turn of the 20th century Birmingham and there weren't anything but white people around Birmingham at that time. I suspect a pot's trying to kettle me.

And I did say "average Pakistani." Did you read my post as closely as it appears you read Tolkien? Which is to say not very closely at all?

 

[Elf Defiler Korgan]

It's a sensitive topic to be sure, but Hobbits are fair-skinned. A little white-slacker people, smoking dope, brewing mead, picking vegetables and far from the Southron or the Easterlings in colouration.

I'm going to have to say it, in the world of Tolkien, the only dark-skinned people are the goblins, the orcs and their allies. They are spread out, but concentrated in the south, south-east and far east. They get dark indeed, but they are the bad guys. Colouration in Tolkien is influenced by climate, geography and merging a fantasy world with the real world in that south of europe you get Africa, east of europe you get the browning middle east.

A touchy subject to be sure. Alas it is a mythos where the good guys are the white guys. On Dwarves they are so far north, that is also the reason they aren't tanned to black.

 

[Elf Defiler Korgan]

This is just bogus. I get that this could be misconstrued as racial profiling, but its god damn Hobbits! I hate to let every non-light skinned race out there know, but LOTR and The Hobbit where written in a sort of quasi Medieval european society... only with dwarves, elves, orks, and a medley of other crazy coolness, but not a lot of any other races of cultures beyond what Tolkien thought up.

The real problem is, if I'm gunna be watching The Hobbit, and suddenly a pakistani, black or Asian hobbit was on the screen, as a fan I would, sadly, completely loss any sense of immersion, and immediately think to myself, "whats the deal with that Asian hobbit?". The movie universe was just shattered.

Its not a matter of me being racist, I'd just suddenly realize I'm watching a movie and am in a theater and not Middle Earth.

Feel bad for the poor guy who lost his job over this, even if it was just so the company could save face.

... actually, wait, this whole situation is just ridiculous in general... what I just said is so troll worthy.

Here, here. PC inclusiveness does not belong in Tolkien's visualisation of Middle Earth.

 

[Mako SOLDIER]

So, what? Does this mean that in the interest of equal opportunity employment they aren't gonna cast some Jewish guy as Gollum? That's ridiculous! Everyone knows that Gollum's Jewish.

Ahem, that's Golem you're thinking of. Golem is Jewish, Gollum is named after his own vocal sounds.

Ahem, there's a library full of scholarly research that suggests Tolkien's Gollum was inspired by the Golem of Jewish folklore.

See, for example, http://www.taylor.edu/dotAsset/57599.pdf

Haven't read the rest of your PDF, as I stopped reading right after it claimed the Judaism took the idea of the golem from the bible. Um, no, Judaism came first, otherwise Christ wouldn't have been Jewish now would he. Judaism has a rich enough heritage without having to steal from a younger religion. That pretty much destroyed any credibility that PDF had.

Edit: Just noticed that both post I replied to were yours. Coincidence, not some kind of personal grudge I assure you.

Are you aware that the first five books of the Christian Bible (the so-called Pentateuch) reappear almost word-for-word in the Torah (the Jewish equivalent of the Christian Bible)? In fact, the names of the first five books of the Torah translate from the Hebrew into English as Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, which is precisely what they're called in the English Christian Bible. In fact, Leviticus (which is mostly a set of laws) is named after the Tribe of Levi who, among the so-called Twelve Tribes of Israel, are known as "the law-givers."

Bible or Torah. If you're about talking the first five books of the New Testament or the Torah, ain't no difference.

I am aware of that, but the wording in the pdf implies that Jewish folklore was influenced by the bible when it was clearly influenced by the Torah. That's like me directly copying The Lord out the Rings for the first part of my book and then claiming that Games Workshop's Orks are inspired by my book. To steal an idea and then attempt to take credit for it instead of the original source is pretty low.

In regards to your other post, absolutely, the harfoots clearly do have darker skin, I was merely playing with the wording as your original comment could have been incorrectly taken to mean that all Hobbits were dark skinned.

 

[thedeathscythe]

While I disagree with the idea of racism, aren't all the Tooks lightskinned anyway?

I mean, I've no problem with there being Asian-descent Stoutfellows, but Bilbo et al are all meant to be near anaemic.

While I agree, I don't think it would be wrong with taking a little bit of creative license and casting some other races as the other hobbits in the group Bilbo traveled with. If anything, it would help me keep track of who's who of the lesser characters. Not that you can only make the lesser characters a different race with no consequence, but it'd be pretty hard to now make Bilbo black and just hope we accept it. In fact, I probably wouldn't watch the movie if the actor from the Lord of the Rings movies didn't play him.

 

[JDKJ]

So, what? Does this mean that in the interest of equal opportunity employment they aren't gonna cast some Jewish guy as Gollum? That's ridiculous! Everyone knows that Gollum's Jewish.

Ahem, that's Golem you're thinking of. Golem is Jewish, Gollum is named after his own vocal sounds.

Ahem, there's a library full of scholarly research that suggests Tolkien's Gollum was inspired by the Golem of Jewish folklore.

See, for example, http://www.taylor.edu/dotAsset/57599.pdf

Haven't read the rest of your PDF, as I stopped reading right after it claimed the Judaism took the idea of the golem from the bible. Um, no, Judaism came first, otherwise Christ wouldn't have been Jewish now would he. Judaism has a rich enough heritage without having to steal from a younger religion. That pretty much destroyed any credibility that PDF had.

Edit: Just noticed that both post I replied to were yours. Coincidence, not some kind of personal grudge I assure you.

Are you aware that the first five books of the Christian Bible (the so-called Pentateuch) reappear almost word-for-word in the Torah (the Jewish equivalent of the Christian Bible)? In fact, the names of the first five books of the Torah translate from the Hebrew into English as Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, which is precisely what they're called in the English Christian Bible. In fact, Leviticus (which is mostly a set of laws) is named after the Tribe of Levi who, among the so-called Twelve Tribes of Israel, are known as "the law-givers."

Bible or Torah. If you're about talking the first five books of the New Testament or the Torah, ain't no difference.

I am aware of that, but the wording in the pdf implies that Jewish folklore was influenced by the bible when it was clearly influenced by the Torah. That's like me directly copying The Lord out the Rings for the first part of my book and then claiming that Games Workshop's Orks are inspired by my book. To steal an idea and then attempt to take credit for it instead of the original source is pretty low.

In regards to your other post, absolutely, the harfoots clearly do have darker skin, I was merely playing with the wording as your original comment could have been incorrectly taken to mean that all Hobbits were dark skinned.

Again though, Torah or New Testament Bible. What's the difference? To say something was influenced by the one is probably to just as well say it was influenced by the other. Doesn't a rose, regardless of what you call it, still smell just the same?

 

[SlasherX]

But arent all the hobbits white any way wtf is the problem, they were all white in the lord of the rings movies so WTF, its like saying "I want african villagers" then you say you want only black people, a very resonable request and then you get fired for not having white villager, WTF, and anyway it was written during the 1940's and everyone was racist so there wouldn't be any black people anyway






half troll half serious, hobbits are supposed to be white

 

[Mad World]

Why did only women have to have light-skinned tones? If all Hobbits are Caucasian, why was this requirement only applied to the females who auditioned?

 

[JDKJ]

But arent all the hobbits white any way wtf is the problem, they were all white in the lord of the rings movies so WTF, its like saying "I want african villagers" then you say you want only black people, a very resonable request and then you get fired for not having white villager, WTF, and anyway it was written during the 1940's and everyone was racist so there wouldn't be any black people anyway.

half troll half serious, hobbits are supposed to be white

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

This movie isn't being based on another movie, it's being based on Tolkien's book. There are these things called "books." You ever read one? If not, try it sometime. You may be pleasantly surprised. It can be a quite enjoyable experience. If you're new to books, I suggest you start out with the "Dick and Jane" series. They're really cool. They've got a dog named Spot. And every page has a picture of Dick and Jane. Sometimes the picture's of Dick and Jane with their dog, Spot. I think you'll like them.

 

[The Random One]

I don't know. I don't see why Hobbits can't be black but I can see why Elves can't (those are other guys, and (c) Wizards? of the Coast?, Inc) so I'm very confused about what to think about this one.

 

[JDKJ]

It's a sensitive topic to be sure, but Hobbits are fair-skinned. A little white-slacker people, smoking dope, brewing mead, picking vegetables and far from the Southron or the Easterlings in colouration.

I'm going to have to say it, in the world of Tolkien, the only dark-skinned people are the goblins, the orcs and their allies. They are spread out, but concentrated in the south, south-east and far east. They get dark indeed, but they are the bad guys. Colouration in Tolkien is influenced by climate, geography and merging a fantasy world with the real world in that south of europe you get Africa, east of europe you get the browning middle east.

A touchy subject to be sure. Alas it is a mythos where the good guys are the white guys. On Dwarves they are so far north, that is also the reason they aren't tanned to black.

Read Tolkien. According to his own words, the Harfoot Hobbits are "brown-skinned."

 

[nondescript]

While I disagree with the idea of racism, aren't all the Tooks lightskinned anyway?

I mean, I've no problem with there being Asian-descent Stoutfellows, but Bilbo et al are all meant to be near anaemic.

This was my thought. Sure, it's considered racist to tell someone they can't be a hobbit just 'cause they aren't "white" enough, but can anyone view Bilbo Baggins played by Deep Roy? Years of his portrayal as a dwarfed (medical term, not the race) human have always painted him as a jolly caucasian. Tolkien identified with the hobbits more than any race, since he grew up from a poor and distinctly rural background. So it's safe to assume he saw at least some of them as white.
Then there is continuity. Most of us who will see The Hobbit have also by now seen The Lord of the Rings Trilogy So we all say Ian Holm as Bilbo. While another person as Bilbo is all too likely, if we go from a white male to a black male, there will be some who will feel confused, betrayed, cheated, or a combination of all three. Ian Holm did well as Bilbo, and I think fans will only accept someone who can pass as his younger self. But maybe I don't have as much faith in the fans as others.

I guess all I have to say is while I am glad they will consider other ethnic groups for hobbits, I don't want Deep Roy as Bilbo. That would just seem wrong.