Join The Oreo Experience on The Film Method with Cindy Freeman!
Yes, Oreo Barbie will be listening, too
Listen live tonight by clicking here: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/film-method
Up for discussion:
And lots more!
You can listen live, call in or join the online chat.
Hope to see you there!!
There was a time when the lauded black athlete was skinny, short, jaunty and not nearly as scary as a basketball player with a grip of guns in a locker room. There was a time when the worst a blacklete could do to you was kick you in the shins and not kill you then make a terrifying reality show post acquittal. When the abused animals in their care weighed 1500 racing pounds instead of 80 fighting ones.
I’m talking about black jockeys.
Between about 1865 and 1900, of color riders dominated the sport. Going to see a race was like watching the NBA finals and black jockeys set impressive records.
Luckily, their legacy was preserved and distilled into a piece of sculpture that you can still sometimes find today. The lawn jockey.
While many lawn jockeys are now painted white, the history of the statue remains in tact.
This makes equestrian events a perfect choice for Oreos. Not only are few to no black riders of note on the circuit, but putting that jaunty outfit will give you the perfect chance to make an on-color joke and assuage the minds of those around you. Because if you can’t laugh at history, what can you do with it?
Looking for other jobs that are good for Oreos? How about shilling for classic American institutions!
See how The Oreo Experience responds to other animals.
or
Check out how horses can help you hook up with an Oreo.
I dug up some journal entries from my trip abroad. Here is one of them.
Dateline: Amsterdam. Even among the pastoral tulip fields and gently twirling windmills, it was impossible to escape the sting of my ethnicity.
I spent some time traveling with a friend to a few cities and here was the conversation I overheard while
I ate my feelings that day. And they were delicious!
waiting on line for dutch pancakes.
Friend: Pardon. Zit hier iemand?
Local: No, the seat’s free.
Friend: Oh, you speak English.
Local: Yeah. Where are you from?
Friend: The states. Los Angeles.
Local: Oh, I hear it’s dangerous there.
Friend: Can be.
Local: Because of the blacks?*
A moment later, I sat down in front of my friend and my new Dutch buddy with a plate of piping hot pannenkoeken. Now, had I not been a practiced Oreo, I would have wanted to pour those piping hot pannenkoeken down the front of my new buddy’s shirt. But, being the Oreo that I am, I supported his point.
Me: Well, you just have to pay attention to where you are. If you come visit, you’ll see. That’s why I moved to Hancock Park.
I could have made him feel suuuper uncomfortable. But instead, I fostered international relations with the right conversation and my appreciation of perfectly pressed pancakes.
*It’s been suggested that I’m making up some of these stories. But no. Really. I’m not.
For other uncomfortable moments I didn’t make up. Check out these posts on phone etiquette, getting out of a parking ticket and talking to kids.
An Oreo instructional video on how to keep your summer fun and Oreo-tastic!
Gather the kids around the computer, this one’s for them!
Hey kids of color. Wanna worry about you ability to achieve as much as your teachers do? Then check out the ad at this FootAction store!
I’m not sure which is more horrible. The thug with the grill or the girl much too young for boobs wearing a dress that shows off where her boobs will be while some nowhere near-man boy touches where her underboob will develop in about 10 years. Either way, none of those words should be associated with children. My apologies.
Anyone wanna join me in a cleansing round of cricket?
That these commercials with an of color hero totally make my day!
Everybody SWAN DIVE!
Ever wanted to see just how much you’re glad you’re not an RBP?
Then log on to Harvard’s Project Implicit to get Ivy League recognition of your self hate!
Nice that you can see your social phobias in plain, written words, huh?
The short online test shows whether or not takers have a preference for certain types of faces or if they associate positive or negative things with those faces.
Through other tests, you can also see if you can recognize presidents or famous people better. If you have a clue as to what foreign countries look like. If you’re creeped out by gays or body fat. And/or if you think white people or black people are more likely to carry weapons.
Warning: website does not come with tissues or pre-written apology notes.
Don’t worry, people on both sides of the pond feel the same way! And if you’re young enough, you might just admit it! Did you take the test? Congrats, you deserve a treat!
a) old
b) tired
c) an overused trope
d) lazy writing
e) umm…true?
Included in my work writing for and working in film and television, I often get the chance to do coverage. For the two people who aren’t my industry friends reading this blog, coverage is what happens when a non-executive type like myself reads a script for an executive type and writes a synopsis and feedback on the quality of the script. This is often a script’s first step toward not being made and provides writers like myself with valuable info.
Do enough coverage and you have a head’s up on what’s being submitted so you can either jump on a good bandwagon or avoid a tired subject
. Also, you get a by proxy education as you read what does and does not work. What does work, apparently, because I’ve read it about a million times in the 5 years I’ve been doing this is one simple fact:
RBP are sassy, mean and HILARIOUS!
I just read a script and since I’ll probably be sued for saying who it was for or what the script was or who the writer was, I’ll just say this and hope that s/he is reading.
One of the characters was described thusly: “SHAKWANDA, a sassy African American receptionist…” and then she went on to have every line be “oh, nuh uh!” “I do NOT need this today,” “you best leave me alone fo’ I cut you,” etc. This would be unremarkable except that with the exception of one glorious family script that for the same above reasons, I cannot name, every script with a black character that I end up reading is pretty much written this way.
There is some variation, of course. Sometimes the RBP in question is an athlete, sometimes an oversexed teen. But the character is always the same. They are not the hero, they are not the love interest, their lines haughtily punctuate the ends of scenes and their character arc only bends them from totally sassy, to slightly less sassy.
Needless to say, I am soooo over this.
I mean, c’mon. Just like I said in my open letter to Oprah, I have worked waaaaayyyy too hard for the only thing I need to be able to avoid are an accent and an attitude. I was born not talking that way. I would need the best accent coaches ever to figure out how to say grrrrl. And those years of ballet did not teach me to roll my neck. So help me keep my game up by keeping up yours.
What was pitched as as a trip for tapas in Topanga turned to a treacherous trial of trying to squeeze my sedan in a safe spot the side of a steep steep
*sigh* I guess I will just have to carry a valet around with me.
slope two blocks away from the party.
The view was amazing, the company was great and the food was fantastic, so much so that the three pounds I just lost returned with a vengeance.
Getting out of my car, however, required a firm understanding of physics, cleats and a leap of faith as I sprung from my 45 degree angled seat, braced for landing on the soft, gravely shoulder and scampered across the street so that I didn’t get squashed by cars flying around the blind curve.
And while I will rarely if ever turn down an invite for Spanish appetizers, I did wonder, what’s the etiquette when you live in a place where parking a car is next to impossible. The house had a small driveway–enough for the family’s car–but that was it. The neighborhood was situated in the middle of a mountain pass, so there were no businesses nearby with parking lots available to borrow. There was hardly any shoulder on the road and what shoulder there was was taken up by the sharp rise of a slope.
In LA, we have plenty of areas like this. There’s mountains like Topanga where you can slide off to your death without too much effort. Permit heavy areas like West Hollywood, where even with a guest pass, you sometimes need to bring an extra pair of shoes for the half mile hike you will inevitably take to your buddy’s pad, Hollywood proper where irresponsible city planning has led to parking fees hovering somewhere around $2/fifteen minutes, Downtown where the proximity of decent area to skid row is unsettling or Hancock Park and Silverlake type areas that are just so popular that even with a decent amount of street space. Though, I guess there’s always the 101 and 405 where lots of people find places to park.
What do you think? Should invites to places like this come with warnings/suggestions? A valet? Or maybe it’s just a clever way to invite solitude?
This video features no black people. And is set in England. And is funny. And thus, Oreo approved.
Well, that one girl is brownish.
The Oreo Experience 