USC study: Hollywood bias so deeply ingrained making it difficult to improve diversity

By Louis Chan
Reprinted from AsAm News

HOW FAR has Hollywood advanced on the big screen when it comes to diversity?

Despite the brouhaha that arose the last two years about the lack of casting opportunities for actors of color, a new report released this morning by The Media, Diversity, & Social Change (MDSC) Initiative at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism shows not much has changed from last year, and the year before that, and the year before that, and ....

The research exposes the depth and breadth of exclusion. Of the top 100 films of 2015, an overwhelming 73.7 percent of all characters in Hollywood in 2015 were White. Only 3.9 percent were Asian. 49 films had no Asian speaking characters at all. Not one lead or co-lead went to an Asian actor.

Only 12.2 percent of the roles went to Blacks, 5.3 percent to Hispanics. Those percentages are virtually unchanged since 2007.

The statistics for the report were compiled from the top 100 grossing films of 2015. The report has been compiled since 2007, excluding 2011.

In 2015, 73.7 percent of characters were White, 12.2  percent Black, 5.3 percent Latino, 3.9 percent Asian,  less than 1 percent Middle Eastern, American Indian/Alaskan Native and  Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, and 3.6 percent Other or “mixed race.” Together, a total of 26.3 percent of all speaking characters were from an underrepresented racial/ethnic group. There was no change in the percentage of White, Black, Hispanic/Latino, Asian or Other races/ethnicities from 2007 to 2015.

Only 14 of the movies depicted an underrepresented lead or co lead. Nine of the leads/co leads were Black, one Latino, and four were mixed race. Not one lead or co-lead was played by an Asian actor.

“Everyone deserves a chance to be seen and heard, and their stories should be told,” says Marc Choueiti, Project Administrator for the Initiative. “Our research points out the gaps and shows where change is possible.”

The Hollywood hierarchy appears to be no different from the diversity shown in the acting ranks.

Somewhat surprisingly, even within the Asian characters, 70 percent were male characters. Asian women were 38.5 percent more likely to be portrayed as mothers. 32.6 percent were dressed in sexy attire. 34.8 percent of Asian women characters appeared nude. Those percentages were all slightly higher than other ethnic groups. Asian men were the least likely to appear in sexy attire (5.4 percent). Latino men were the most likely (12.7 percent). Asian men were also the least likely to appear nude (5.4 percent). Latino men were the most likely (15.5 percent).

“Our work is about bringing evidence and insight to media industries on where diversity is needed. I am in this to change the landscape of humanity, flanked by the next generation of world leaders: USC graduates and undergraduates,” says Dr. Stacy L. Smith, Director of the Media, Diversity, & Social Change Initiative.

(Views From the Edge contributed to this report.)

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TGIF FEATURE: #HollywoodSoWhite - The incredible 'whiteness' of being

Hollywood has a long history of 'yellow face' with some pretty big names taking part including, from left: Marlon Brando, John Wayne and Mickey Rooney. Can you name the films they were in where they played Asians? (For answers, see below.)

I CAN'T WAIT until Chris Rock comes on stage to host the 88th Academy Awards this Sunday. The comedian has not been sh when talking about about Hollywood's portrayal of America and the impact that message has on the definition of who is an American. You can be sure he will have something to say about the ongoing #OscarsSoWhite and #HollywoodSoWhite controversy. 

     RELATED

• Chris Rock on the movie industry's lack of diversity
• Report says Hollywood is an "old (white) boys club)
• #OscarsSoWhite - The Sequel

There is a good possibility that we'll see an Asian/American receive an Oscar. Ronnie del Carmen, co-director and co-writer with Pete Doctor for Pixar's Inside Out, is up for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Screenplay. Del Carmen is one of the Filipinos employed by Pixar who call themselves the Pixnoys, some of whom drew the characters in the movie.

Embarrassed by the all-white nominees in the acting categories for the second straight year, the Oscars is adding a bit of color to its telecast by inviting minorities as presenters. (See, folks, we don't discriminate!)

Among the presenters are a few Asian/Americans including: Priyanka Chopra, Olivia Munn, Dev Patel, Syrian/American Sacha Baron Cohen and Byung-hun Lee. The last name might be unfamiliar to American moviegoers. He's a big star in Korea and has appeared in a few Hollywood films such as two of the G.I. Joe movies and Reds 2. 

For those of you who can't wait for the Academy Awards, Last Week Tonight host John Oliver presented this "report" on the film industry's diversity problem that explains why there aren't more AAPI actors being nominated - all the big roles are going to non-Asians. The video is pretty darn hilarious ... if ... It. Wasn't. So. True.

The 88th Academy Awards will be aired: Feb. 28 starting at 5:30 p.m. Pacific on ABC. Red carpet coverage starts at 4 p.m. Pacific. you can also lifestream the event if you want to avoid the censors on at ABC.com or the WATCH ABC app.

Answers: Brando in Teahouse of the August Moon (Ah, so.), Wayne in Genghis Khan as the title character (really?) and Rooney in an incredibly insulting performance in Breakfast At Tiffany's.

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For more news about Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders, read AsAm News.

Report: Hollywood continues to be "an old (white) boys club"

WHAT ELSE IS NEW?

The new study released Feb. 22 on the motion picture and television industry about diversity in entertainment media is nothing new. It merely confirmed what minority actors and pop-culture pundits have been saying for years, Hollywood is "an old boys" club that systematically excludes African/Americans, Asian/Americans, Hispanic/Americans and other people of color.

Even as America is shifting to a minority majority country, you wouldn't know it by watching the movies and TV shows coming out of what most people consider the entertainment capitol of the world.

The USC report "Inclusion or Invisibility: Comprehensive Report on Diversity in Entertainment," concluded that an "epidemic of invisibility" runs throughout the entertainment media industry as if people of color didn't exist in America.

It is as if the media industry is in a time warp where it is perpetually stuck in 1950.

RELATED: #OscarsSoWhite - The Sequel

A study released by the Media, Diversity and Social Change Initiative at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism gives a failing grade to every movie studio and most TV networks.

Stacy L. Smith, a USC professor and one of the study's authors, said, "The prequel to OscarsSoWhite is HollywoodSoWhite," in reference to the hashtag that went viral on social media when all of the 20 the Oscar acting nominees turned out to be all white for the 2015 awards show. For the second straight year, the nominees for this year's Academy Awards that will air next weekend, didn't include a single actor of color or a single movie dominated by minority actors. Only the nomination of Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu for the film Revenant broke the string of blinding whiteness.

Characters from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups are also excluded or erased from mediated storytelling. No platform presents a profile of race/ethnicity that matches proportional representation in the U.S. Over 50% of stories featured no Asian speaking characters, and 22% featured no Black or African/American characters. The complete absence of individuals from these backgrounds is a symptom of a diversity strategy that relies on tokenistic inclusion rather than integration.

Some of the more striking discrepancies include the fact that only a third of all speaking characters are female, at least half of all stories don't include a speaking African-American or Asian character, and females represent less than a quarter of all top executives. In short, the film and television industry does not match the demographic breakdown of the United States.

"Hollywood is not really (about) numbers, more so than it is nepotism," said Miki Turner, a full time lecturer at USC's Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism. "People tend to hire the people they know and [that] look like them."

Including more underrepresented directors can lead to more diversity on screen, too. Only 26.2 percent of on screen characters came from underrepresented backgrounds whenever there was a white director. However, that numbers rose to 43.7 percent when a minority directed a project.

It appears that race, ethnicity and gender have a direct impact on what groups are represented on screen. Instead of hiring actors based on talent, these other factors play a more influential role.""People are invisible. Every person deserves to be seen and heard. These data make a compelling case that storytellers need to think beyond their own bias.”

"We see a titled reality of exclusion for different groups," Smith said. "My hope is that companies will… take actionable steps… to be more inclusive, so that we can see talent that looks like the population of the United States thriving on screen and behind the camera."

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For more news about Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders, read AsAm News.