TRUE COLOURS
The global call for more racial diversity on stages, screens and runways is highlighting the fact Australia is lagging behind. Local theatre directors are among those leading the charge for improvement.
The global call for more racial diversity on stages, screens and runways is highlighting the fact Australia is lagging behind.
When Miranda Tapsell was growing up she always celebrated Christmas with her non-indigenous cousins. Their skin colour wasn’t the same – her mother is indigenous, her father isn’t – but the difference ends there. “I look at photos of us and we’re all wearing Christmas hats and opening presents together. I’d never question that my cousin is my cousin,” says the award-winning star of The Sapphires. But if you switched on the TV or turned to the catwalk you’d be unlikely to see a similar situation represented.
Tapsell used her Logie award acceptance speech last year to call for television heavyweights to “put more beautiful people of colour on TV and connect viewers in ways which transcend race and unite us”. Perhaps the industry was listening. In June, Tapsell will play a press gallery journalist alongside Oscar-nominated actress Jacki Weaver in Foxtel’s political thriller Secret City; she is in Stan’s TV adaptation of Wolf Creek, plus season three of the show Love Child. And theatre director Lee Lewis has cast her as the sister of (non-indigenous) Kate Mulvany in Bell Shakespeare/ Griffin Theatre’s co-production of Molière’s The Literati.
But is it enough? A 2015 Australian Bureau of Statistics report shows that more than one in four Australians was born overseas. But is that diversity reflected in fashion or the arts? Internationally, the autumn/winter ’16/’17 runways saw New York designer Zac Posen cast predominantly black models; Kanye West shared his thoughts by selecting a non-Caucasian line-up. Yet overall, according to the Fashion Spot, fewer than 25 per cent of models who walked in the major autumn/winter ’16/’17 shows were racially diverse.
And what of the fashion industry in Australia? There are signs the local catwalks are moving away from the prevailing sunkissed blonde, with exciting things afoot for indigenous model Charlee Fraser (who walked in shows in New York and Paris earlier this year). Aboriginal model Samantha Harris – who graced the cover of Vogue Australia in 2010 – believes things are changing. “I think there is a huge amount of diversity on the catwalk compared to, say, the 90s. I would, however, like to see more indigenous Australians on the international circuit,” she says, adding: “To see my friend Yaya [Deng, the KenyanAustralian model] front the latest Westfield campaign is a step in the right direction, and for brands such as David Jones and Seafolly to embrace my look is a very positive contribution.”
Paul Thomas, general manager of Chic Management, which looks after Harris and Deng and signed Jessica Gomes to David Jones, believes the local fashion industry is improving but that more needs to be done. “We’re scouting new girls who have a strong ethnic feel … which is exciting,” he says, citing Chic models such as Eurasians Rachel Rutt and Raenee Sydney and African model Sahara. He believes social media is one of the reasons the industry is becoming more inclusive, with advertising agencies and fashion houses responding to the access they now have to who is buying. “There is a nice connection with multicultural, indigenous Australia. We’re making great steps but we still have a long way to go.”
At Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia in May, Sudanese model Subah notably opened for Georgia Alice. Deng, who was booked frequently during the shows, hopes her high profile will inspire young Australians from diverse racial backgrounds. “It’s essential for the Australian fashion industry to have more diversity on the catwalk,” she says. “Every background, culture and individual deserves to be represented. It’s important to think about the unconscious prejudice that exists in our society.”
Stage and screen should be the ideal place for seeing our own stories told. But are they doing their job? The answer seems to be yes, but more is never enough when it comes to racially diverse casting and so-called “colour-blind” casting, where an actor of diverse race is cast in a non-culturally-specific role. Theatre directors Kip Williams, Matthew Lutton, Wesley Enoch, Sarah Goodes and Eamon Flack are determined colour-blind casting should be the norm; Bell Shakespeare makes a point of opening auditions to all actors, not just those put forward by agents.
Williams was applauded for including a racially diverse cast in Louis Nowra’s play The Golden Age, casting indigenous actor Ursula Yovich as a white settler with Asian-Australian actor Remy Hii as her child. “I always try to find a way to make sure the play talks to an audience today, so I wanted to put together an ensemble of actors that represent contemporary Australia,” says Williams, who has cast Jamaican-born actor Zahra Newman in the Melbourne Theatre Company production of Miss Julie; and indigenous actor Robert Collins in a Sydney Theatre production of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. “Once you’ve made the decision to colour-blind cast you’re liberated to bring the best actors on board.”
There are more examples: Newman in Chekov’s The Cherry Orchard (MTC) and Ivanov for Belvoir; Hazem Shammas in
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Bell’s Romeo and Juliet and Paula Arundell in Belvoir’s Angels in America. “There’s still a lot of work to be done but the audience will embrace it, and [be] enriched by a diverse experience and one that more truthfully represents the world we live in. But there’s a need for constant vigilance,” Williams says.
Samoan-born actor Ray Chong Nee is buoyed by the changes, recently performing in Camus’s The Outsider and Bell Shakespeare’s The Dream, but says often non-Caucasian actors are cast in roles unrelated to their own ethnicity. “I’ve been cast as an Arab and an Indian,” he says. Chong Nee is preparing to play the title role of Bell Shakespeare’s Othello, and says the day we achieve true equality is the day Othello is played by a white actor and the rest of the cast is non-Caucasian. (Michael Kantor’s allindigenous Malthouse Theatre re-telling of King Lear, titled The Shadow King, tours to the UK in June.)
“We just have to keep trying to break that glass ceiling until it shatters; or find other ways of infiltrating it by having the support of directors currently moving the issue forward by saying it’s not about the race, creed or colour. It’s just about the work,” he says.
Australian television, however, lags far behind the US, where series such as Empire, How to Get Away with Murder and Scandal have long featured racial diversity. Screen Australia is currently examining TV drama to ensure local content ref lects a multicultural and indigenous Australia. Children watching Play School see Aboriginal actors Tapsell and Luke Carroll, Chinese-Australian Karen Pang and New Zealand-Australian Jay Laga’aia before growing up to see TV commercials almost devoid of diversity; morning news presenters are Caucasian on every channel other than SBS.
Tapsell says the fact she plays a journalist in Secret City is a sign things are changing. “It’s such a big deal because how often do Australians see on screen an educated young Aboriginal woman who ends up as a press gallery journalist? If people don’t see it they don’t believe it,” she says. “So I think there is a certain shift. I just question how big a stride we’re taking.”