Hollywood has been aiming to create a more diverse landscape for people of color. According to Kumail Nanjiani, however, Hollywood still has limits for what roles they can play. Specifically, Kumail Nanjiani claims that Hollywood doesn’t want non-white actors to play villains.
He revealed as much while speaking with Esquire UK. Nanjiani was promoting his new limited series Welcome to Chippendales when the discussion about nonwhite actors came up.
Here’s what he had to say:
“I think that Hollywood now — even though they’re trying to be more diverse — is still weird,” he stated.
Additionally, Nanjiani claims that “good intentions can sometimes lead to misguided solutions: If the bad guy is a brown guy, what message is that sending?”
He also iterates that he wants to play more villain roles but that it’s difficult to get the parts.
“And that’s just as limiting as anything else,” Nanjiani said. “I want to play more bad guys.”
As a comparison, he mentions actor Sebastian Stan, who many fans will recognize as the Winter Soldier from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. More recently, however, he played a cannibal in last year’s horror film Fresh.
“He does these big Marvel movies, and then he’ll play a psychopath,” he says. “I was told that’s going to be hard because people don’t want to cast nonwhite people as bad guys.”
Interestingly, we have seen backlash for these exact reasons in recent times. For example, the hit Netflix series Wednesday received backlash for having cast black actress Joy Sunday as a bully. Although the character eventually comes around, some viewers were still disappointed that she started out as mean.
As Hollywood continues to carve out a more diverse landscape for people of color, we will likely continue to have these conversations. But one thing is for certain – Hollywood shouldn’t be limiting these roles regardless. Especially if an actor like Kumail Nanjiani wants to be able to play villains just like anyone else.
Fans can currently see Kumail Nanjiani in the Hulu limited series Welcome to Chippendales.