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  Black Princess, White World

  Posted Thursday, March 19, 2009 10:09 AM | By Dayo Olopade
  Nina, I think you’re right on about the silliness of hating the light-skinned Prince Naveen character in Disney’s forthcoming Princess and the Frog movie. He’s clearly black—and for a film set in New Orleans, his creolized look is pretty accurate.
  
  But the increased sensitivities are totally understandable—it’s taken how long exactly for the Disney marketers to come up with a black princess? I wrote on this movie as a leap forward for beauty politics back in December 2007; the Mickey Mousers have cycled through the Middle Eastern, Chinese, Native American, and Hawaiian princesses, not to mention six kinds of white—why not black? Compounding the frustration is the distinct lack of “live action” roles for black actors and actresses, which makes any perception of Hollywood bias smart a bit more.
  
  I’ll keep my powder dry because I plan to write a longer piece on the topic soon, but I think this debate is most productive when seen as an issue of branding: Now that Princess Tiana will join Jasmine, Belle, and Ariel on lunchboxes, stickers, and sleeping bags—and will, presumably, have her own doll—shouldn’t we be cheering the crossover potential of this flick? Much like the kerfuffle surrounding stuffed likenesses of Malia and Sasha Obama, I think it’s never bad, and in fact, deliciously ironic, that little white girls might soon be toting black dolls around town.
  Filed under: Princess and the Frog, Prince Naveen, Disney movies, black characters in Hollywood

About Dayo Olopade

• Dayo Olopade is the Washington Reporter for the Root.

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