At the beginning of this month, Quentin Letts of the Daily Mail got himself into a whole world of pain. He’s the paper’s theatre critic and had been to see The Fantastic Follies of Mrs Rich, a Restoration comedy by Mary Pix.
In his review of the revival (staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford-Upon-Avon), Letts did an unforgivable thing. He questioned a casting choice. Specifically, he questioned whether one of the roles which Letts claimed was miscast was given to the actor in question “because he is black?” He went on, “If so, the RSC’s clunking approach to politically correct casting has again weakened its stage product.”
The RSC’s artistic director, Gregory Doran, and its executive director, Catherine Mallyon, issued a joint-statement in response to Lett’s review, claiming that the reviewer “seems to demonstrate a blatantly racist attitude to a member of the cast”. They continued: “We are very proud to be working with every member of the company, each of whom has been asked to join us in Stratford because we value and recognise their unique skills and talents.”
Whereupon various actors and bystanders also piled in on Twitter to denounce Letts and demand that he be barred from attending theatres in future. Even though Letts had nowhere in his review said that a black actor should not appear in a Restoration comedy.
This is worth revisiting because, only weeks after this furore, that very same month, the BBC broke the news that Sierra Boggess had withdrawn from a performance at the Proms this summer.
The Broadway star had been due to appear in a concert performance of West Side Story. But when the programme was announced, there was some denunciation on social media about Boggess (who is reportedly Caucasian) playing the role of Maria (a fictional character who is Puerto Rican). One Twitter user wrote: “You are a Caucasian woman and this character is Puerto Rican. It’s not like you’re hurting for job opportunities. Stop taking roles from actors of colour.’”
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