Jack & Jill Politics

Whatever he is, he looks like an arrogant jackass. I'll bet the poor little black princess had to fight him for the mirror.

He looks like he is supposed to be light skinned black to me. Certainly not white

I like it. It's a nice change. He looks Latino.

How come a male can only be "genuinely" black if he's extremely dark in complexion? And she can be almost white / mixed and given the benefit of blackness? I think almost every bit of media has the black guy dark and crispy like Michael Jordan / Taye Diggs, and the women so light and near-white - like an Angelina Jolie with tan makeup on.

There's never any real variety. I can count on my fingers the number of light skinned black guys, and dark skinned black women I see in the entertainment media.

He looks high yellow, but if they wanted him to be black why isn;t his complexion dark like the princess? Is he SUPPOSED to be mixed race?

He's ambiguous, but he'll wind up being a 'person of color'.

LOL

She is pretty.

my first reaction was that Disney was obviously trying to pawn the sister off to a white boy, and not happy about it, given Disney's dubious racial history, but then I looked at the picture of my parents, which looks exactly like the picture from Disney, except that my dad's hair is nappier than (generic) yours, and my mom's is the curly one (go figure), so i don't know what to think ....

thats an interesting choice for the prince and i think it was intentional, we are talking about disney here!....i hate that stuff like this brings up the whole light skin vs dark skin thing in our community but i must say that it is a beautiful thing that we come in all shades of black and brown...i luv all my brothas and sistas light skin or dark and issues like that usually are really divisive

You'll missed Twitches, didn't ya? The Mowry Twins were the Princess's exiled to Earth, Mom, the Queen was Kristen Wilson-why isn't she on the Great Wall of Sexy. Alas, Dad was white but not on stage much.
As to the Prince in the cartoon could be anybody. Hmm...Bobby Jindal on steroids?

I wrote about a similar topic a couple of weeks ago over at my blog. check it out:

http://reachblack.blogspot.com/2009/03/corporat...

EVENING THREAD IS UP

Didn't Jamie Foxx say that Rick Fox looked like he was in the Taliban?

Look, Disney by its nature goes for the broadest, dumbest demo it can. This is one way. Just be thankful they didn't make this a cheery romp about slavery...wait, they already did ...zippity do da zippity-ey...

www.natturnersrevenge.blogspot.com

Didn't Jamie Foxx say that Rick Fox looked like he was in the Taliban?

LMAO!! Jamie is a fool.

He's voiced by a Brazilian guy, so I'm thinking either Latino or fair-looking brother.

They did the same thing with Brandy Norwood who played Cinderella (live action) with Whitney Houston as the fairy godmother. The Prince was Filipino, with Whoopi as his mom, and his dad as a white guy...I think it was Matthew Garber.

Honestly, though, folks oughta take a pill...it's the OTHER trailer from this film that really sucks. Some mosquito or roach looks like a crackhead with teeth problems.

And on the other side, The Mouse House needs some effing help marketing to people of color, I swear.

I never saw Brandy's Cinderella, but the thought of Whoopi Goldberg and some unknown white guy breeding a Filipino just turned my stomach upside down.

I have a friend who is half-black and half-filipino. You know what he calls himself? N*ggapino.

Garber is known as a Broadway musical actor. You don't see him in too many big movies.

It DOES make you wonder just what these fools were thinking when they were casting. It just didn't make any sense at all...and I just wondered why in hell they didn't want to cast a black prince.

Sammy Davis, Jr., BTW, was part-Puerto Rican.

Shoot, Boriquas and Dominicans are black as far as I'm concerned. They lack for nothing physically...Loves them too.

Well, according to this article the prince is NOT a brotha.

But let's say Disney is gonna try to "pass" this character off as black, why not avoid all the drama and make the prince an identifiably black man? What? So brothas who look like brothas can't be princes?

And I don't think they were trying to make them look like PBO and FLOTUS because even though PBO is light, you know he's black. Hell, he looks like Michael Evans from Good Times!

Disney gets the gas face for this mess.

ETA: Another article from 2008 about this movie.....
Published: Jul 21, 2008
Princess Tiana: Disney's 1st African American Princess Stereotyped?
by Toshiba Reynolds

Princess Tiana represents Disney's first African American Princess. It was originally to be set in 1920s New Orleans and depicted a black maid named Maddy.

With the help of Maddy's voodoo practicing fairy godmother, she would win the affection of a white prince after being rescued from another voodoo practictioner.

This original story was allegedly sacked after criticism and complaints of racism and Maddy has now become Tiana, reports the Daily Voice. The movie's title also reportedly changed, from The Frog Princess, the title of a classic fairytale, to the current The Princess and The Frog.

When completed, it will become the 48th animated film by Walt Disney Animation Studios.
http://www.postchronicle.com/cgi-bin/artman/exe...

Not the 'gas face' My Lawd...

The Mouse House, just like most big studios, has no clue what regular ol' black folks look like, act like. Apparently, Calvin from the MickeyD's commercial ain't even good enough for them. They, like most big studios, just can't seem to imagine black on black love, let alone the whole ridiculous fairy tale princess bullsh#$^.!

According to the article I read, it doesn't say that he is white, but that people perceive him as white, even though the prince is voiced by a Brazilian guy.

It's like putting a Ken doll in a vat of caramel-colored paint, though. He's not quite Latino either.

Weird.

Disney has to get a clue.

Video comments wow

Forget the Prince!
The Princess looks HOT!

Well you know, they can't have TWO dark-skinned Black people, who would want to see that?? *sarcasm*

I agree with Predacious, they were probably inspired by the Obamas when they created these characters lol.

The prince could pass for being either Black or Latino actually lol.

He looks Black to me...besides we come in all hues, hair textures, etc. etc.

It would've been better if he had a low-cut fade, instead of those tendrils hanging down in his face....but he is very much the complexion of many Blacks in this country.

Sure, he could be black. But, come on! Look at the difference in skin tone alone between the princess and the prince. Look at his hair!

Yes, I'm fully aware that people of the African Diaspora vary in complexion and hair texture. However, I think there's something else at play here... this is supposedly Disney's first animated feature with a black princess - an obviously black princess, if we're taking strictly surface representation. I don't think they were ready to go all the way and make the prince obviously dark as well. Baby steps I guess...

This has long been an issue in Hollywood flicks, and it's funny that the same rule apparently applies even in cartoons! We can't pair up 2 dark-skinned people in the same movie, because it might automatically alienate a certain group of the film's potential audience - read, white people. So, just as we do with live action pictures, in order to guarantee rich box office returns, we'll cast a black woman/man, with a white man/woman, in a love story.

How often do we get to see love stories on screen featuring 2 obviously black people in the starring roles?

The biggest box-office movie of 2009 thus far featured a love story between two African-Americans...Yeah, it was Madea Goes To Jail.

We have Love Jones, Love & Basketball, and any number of similar films. Which films are you referring to (that have interracial love stories)? The only thing that comes to mind for me is "Guess who's coming to Dinner" with Poitier and "Somethiing New" with Sanaa Lathan.

I do agree with you regarding the Disney characters. The animators should have gone with caramel and broadened the nose a lil' bit more. We don't deserve a Prince with a Michael Jackson nose, dayummit! We've waited long e-fuggin-nuff as it is.

And who are the primary audiences for films like Love Jones, and Love & Basketball, and even Madea Goes To Jail? These aren't films meant to appeal to a broad multi-racial audience - they are made specifically for black audiences, and if there's some spillover, that's the proverbial icing on the cake.

Disney's animated movies are made for wide audiences. When a big budgeted, Hollywood love story, aimed at a broad audience, features 2 African American leads, let me know...

How about Will Smith and Rosario Dawson in 7-Pounds? There you go.

Most Black folks know that we come in different hues, even in the same immediate family. They both look like they're related to me.

Yes, he does look like Rick Fox.

Prince look like a brotha to me.

Do you think that is Nia Long on his arm?

I think they colored them to favor Barack & Michelle in skin tone.

does it matter what color he is? It does not matter to me.