What can you do about Apu? A lot.
Growing up in California’s Bay Area as an awkward, shy son of Pakistani Muslim immigrants in the 1990s, I didn’t see my stories or family represented in the mainstream media. This was before ESPN started airing the spelling bee competition and CNN hired Sanjay Gupta.
My friends and I made do with movies such as “Short Circuit,” which featured the robot Johnny Number 5 engaging in hilarious shenanigans with his Indian friend Fisher Stevens, a white actor in brown paint doing a thick Indian accent. The bar was low in the real world, so we migrated to animation instead, hoping for fully realized characters in the 2-D world of “The Simpsons.”
Most of us happily embraced Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, the successful owner of the Springfield convenience store Kwik-EMart. Sure, he had dubious sanitary standards when it came to his hot dogs, but here was a highly educated, undocumented immigrant who achieved the “American Dream” (in 2-D, at least). He had a PhD, he sang in the barbershop quartet with Homer and, before settling down with the attractive and smart Manjula, he was a charismatic playboy. Most important, he was an integral character in the Simpsons universe who was able to be a co-protagonist of several episodes. Only in a cartoon, we thought, could people who look like us achieve such a feat. Brown people existed only as cabdrivers or incompetent, violent terrorists on the screens.
For those of us with low expectations, starving for any representation, Apu was a breath of fresh air. But that doesn’t mean he, or “The Simpsons,” get a lifetime pass to perpetuate lazy stereotypes. Any piece of art, no matter how well intentioned, harmless or silly, is not above reproach or critical examination. Especially when it’s “The Simpsons,” one of the most influential TV shows of all time.
As such, the creators and writers of “The Simpsons,” like the rest of us, have a responsibility to upgrade and evolve their characters to align with cultural norms of the day. Tokenized stereotypes won’t cut it for an emerging generation that is demanding full and equal representation.
That’s why it was so disappointing to see the show’s response to comedian Hari Kondabolu’s documentary, “The Problem With Apu,” about how South Asians like himself wrestled with the popular, endearing character who was simultaneously reductionist and offensive. Apu is voiced by a white actor, Hank Azaria, who admitted the creators asked him to create a broad, offensive accent. For Hari and many others, Apu is a white guy mocking his brown, immigrant parents, who are either sidelined as tokens or romanticized as “model minorities,” celebrated for being inoffensive, meek and upwardly mobile.
Instead of engaging with the issue of representation, which would have made for a more satirical and topical show — you know, the type “The Simpsons” used to do years ago - the writers responded with the worst creative sin: laziness.
The scene featured Marge Simpson, the mother, sitting in bed with her daughter Lisa, the moral compass of the show, lamenting that the book “The Princess in the Garden” would be “politically incorrect” for today’s audiences. Lisa then turned directly to the audience and says, condescendingly: “Something that started decades ago and was applauded and inoffensive is now politically incorrect. What can you do?”
Well, a lot. First, don’t hijack your show’s most intellectual and empathetic voice, Lisa, as a foil for the writers’ unwillingness to be self-critical and engage their blind spots when it comes to listening to people of color who feel silenced and misunderstood. Thus, the show engages in another major sin: omission. After Lisa’s finger-wagging, the camera pans to a photo of Apu with the inscription “Don’t have a cow!” Apu, who is a supporting character, is robbed of lines, rendered mute and frozen in a suffocating frame, smiling as a token prop. That’s exactly how so many people of color feel in real life - all the time