Jungle Book DRAMA!- Page 2

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:12pm

I don't understand why an Italian human playing a monkey is stereotypically black. The character of King Louie was created for the film specifically for "King" Louie Prima. he talks like Louie Prima, he sings like Louie Prima and he dances like Louie Prima.

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:14pm

Once again, King Louie was designed to sound (musically and speaking) like Louie Prima, a popular musician who was Italian, not black.

Smokescreen. And a deliberate casting choice so someone could say, "No, he's not Black."

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:15pm

Eggszactly.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:16pm

John there was no "casting"; The part was WRITTEN for LOUIE PRIMA. There was no "King Louie" in the books.

[Yero my Hero]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:16pm

But...he wasn't. It's not like Prima was directed to "sound black." He was directed to sound like himself.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:19pm

Now's a good time to watch the King in action- and Keely Smith is just amazing- what a beautiful voice!
Louie being Louie

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:21pm

John there was no "casting"; The part was WRITTEN for LOUIE PRIMA. There was no "King Louie" in the books.

Fair enough! Take out the word "casting" from my post, and replace it with "writing".

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:22pm

It's not like Prima was directed to "sound black."

He didn't need to be. He already does ("did" - may he rest in elegant peace).

Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:22 PM

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:24pm

It was pretty clever of them to express all that racism towards black people through that part they wrote for the Italian feller.

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:26pm

It was pretty clever of them to express all that racism towards black people through that part they wrote for the Italian feller.

Yes, it was! As I wrote a little earlier, I'm also impressed by the lyrics of I wanna Be Like You.

Also, I'm not so sure they were "expressing" racism, so much as pointing it out.
Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:26 PM

[Yero my Hero]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:27pm

He didn't need to be. He already does ("did" - may he rest in elegant peace).

You could argue that Prima was racist for exploiting the black sound, but how is that evidence that Disney, and the entire film THE JUNGLE BOOK, was racist? Prima was a popular musician with a well-known voice, so they cast him in their movie. Decades earlier, they had cast another popular musician with a well-known voice, Cliff Edwards, to be the voice of Jiminy Cricket.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:28pm

The Disney Studios were well aware of the ****e they got over the Dumbo crows, and deservedly so. Even the very first line of the Wikipedia entry about King Louie says it plainly:

"King Louie is a fictional character in Disney's 1967 animated musical adaptation of The Jungle Book. He is voiced by Louis Prima in the film. Initially, the producers considered Louis Armstrong for the role, but to avoid the likely controversy that would surround casting a black person to voice an ape, they instead chose Prima."

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:32pm

You could argue that Prima was racist for exploiting the black sound

I could, but I wouldn't. I'd be more inclined to feel like he recognized its value and adopted it.

how is that evidence that Disney, and the entire film THE JUNGLE BOOK, was racist?

Kipling was racist. I don't think Disney Studios were necessarily racist. I think it's more likely that they were documenting the culture of the time. Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:32 PM

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:33pm

So Disney, by not wanting to appear racist, is racist?

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:37pm

So Disney, by not wanting to appear racist, is racist?

Bring that little kitty face over here so I can give it a good massage behind the ears!

(see above edit) ...and know that they were covering their asses(ts).

Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:37 PM

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:37pm

I know you're being willfully obtuse, but the mouse factory was never what one could call progressive about racial issues before and in the immediate aftermath of Uncle Walt's deep freeze. Yes, it was a different time. But it was still problematic.

Ditto Kipling and the colonialism. Deciding not to deal with it because it's not deal-withable is probably the only conclusion a Zimmerman could come up with. The problem comes in articulating it at all. She ends up sounding like Marty Short's Nathan Thurm, "I'm not racist, you are."

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:39pm

"Uncle Walt" was accused of being racist, too. Did'ya know that?

(That question was to Joe, not Namo)
Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:39 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:43pm

Instead of getting a black guy to voice the monkey, they got a white guy that merely SOUNDS like a black guy to voice the monkey.

They could've made King Louie sound like a Southern bumpkin, or a Brooklynite, or a Canadian. Or something. After all, as Joe pointed out, they created the character.

But it seems they wanted a distinctive sound for the character.

Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:43 PM

[Unknown User]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:50pm

I guess since I grew up loving Louie Prima it never even occurred to me that he's supposed to "Sound black." He was always one of a kind to me.

And honestly, as a little kid my big objection to Jungle Book was those crows- I told my brother "crows don't sound like that!"

As an adult, I look at the voice talents for Jungle Book and marvel that Winnie the Pooh plays the Snake. How bizarre is that?

and to get back to the stage, Larry Yando is to play Shere Khan. He is a wonderful bad guy and I can't WAIT to see what he does with the part.

[John Adams]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:53pm

Deciding not to deal with it because it's not deal-withable is probably the only conclusion a Zimmerman could come up with.

When someone decides to present a work like this, I wouldn't want to see it changed or altered. I think it's important to present it as it was written so that an audience can be outraged, or "meh", or whatever.

But I would be more impressed if Zimmerman chose to find a way to "make a statement" about the material, in some fashion/facet of the production. Of course she doesn't have to, but I can understand the upset when her statements imply, "I'm gonna pretend it isn't there".

(Did we say the same thing?) Updated On: 6/12/13 at 03:53 PM

[all that jazz]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:54pm

The princess and the frog was also accused of racism, for portraying Disney's first african american princess as a frog. Many believe that Walter himself was a racist, so the studio has for long been accused of racism.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:56pm

I don't think that's why.

[all that jazz]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 3:59pm

Of course there are many other factors but that is one of them.

[Yero my Hero]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 4:00pm

And Pocahontas was accused of racism because there was a song called "Savages," ignoring the fact that the natives sang it about the white men. (The white men sang it about the natives, too -- that was the point of the song, that BOTH groups were ignorant and fearful of the other.)

Lots of things are accused of racism by people who have no idea and are making assumptions, and really just want to be angry about something (THE SCOTTSBORO BOYS, anyone?).

Disney himself may have been racist (how many white men born at the turn of the 20th century weren't, honestly?), but that doesn't mean the entire studio felt that way, or continues to feel that way, and it bugs me every time I see or hear the accusations all over again.

Updated On: 6/12/13 at 04:00 PM

[tazber]

Posted: 6/12/13 at 4:06pm

I have learned so much from this thread (completely sincere).

Some sort of OT questions that pop up:

If King Louie is not in the books, why did Disney design a character and scene with racial overtones if they were so sensitized after Dumbo? There are plenty of other animals they could have chosen as well as other musical styles.