As Disney's would-be blockbuster Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time stampedes into theaters this weekend, concerned parties are asking why the company couldn't find a more authentically complected actor than Jake Gyllenhaal to play the titular Iranian royal. "It's insulting that people of color — especially Middle Easterners or south Asians — are not allowed to portray ourselves in these roles," says blogger Jehanzeb Dar in the L.A. Times. Is the outrage justified or just reflexive?
What's wrong with Iranian actors? This film's "unbearable whiteness" is "depressingly lazy and unimaginative," says Steven Boone at Salon. Using an English accent as "shorthand for nobility and heroism" went out of vogue around the time of Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra. Movies like Mel Gibson's Apocalypto have shown that casting multi-ethnic actors can add "gravity" and "transport young minds." Was Disney afraid "casting Iranians would inflame zealots"?
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