As I sit gazing out the window at the blizzard currently ravaging North Dakota, I am reminded of my favorite Christmas movie, White Christmas. I was also reminded of this movie a few days ago when reading Harry M. Benshoff and Sean Griffin's book, America on Film: Representing race, class, gender, and sexuality at the movies. More specifically, though, the information about jewish actors and the blackface minstrel shows really seemed to resonate as I read the text. A short time later as I pondered these two concepts, I realized that White Christmas also seemed very white. The first concept I would like to touch on is the idea of the minstrel show. According to Benshoff and Griffin in America on Film a minstrel show is "a type of musical comedy variety show that featured white actors impersonating blacks" (p. 79). This was a term I had heard of in the past, as part of a musical number in White Christmas, but never knew what it was or the significance behind it until after I read it the other day. The following clip is the minstrel show number from White Christmas.
This clip is very interesting as it seeks to impersonate the minstrel show in which characters would dress up in blackface and tell jokes. However, if you watched the clip, you would notice none of the actors or actresses did that. I think this has something to do with the post World War II ideologies about race that were starting to show up in film around the time White Christmas was made. There are a few things I did notice, though, that seemed to tell the story of the minstrel show. For instance the lead characters of the number were wearing black clothes. I'm thinking maybe the justification for this was to show the premise behind the minstrel show without having to outright offend any racial groups. Also Mr. Bones was mentioned in the song they were singing in the clip. It seemed significant so I did a Google search and found several sites that talked about a tambourine man and a bone man that were generally included in minstrel shows. If you watched the clip, you would also have noticed the tambourines too. Toward the end of the clip you can get a good look at them and they are red with faces on them. Again, it seems they are trying to capture the premise behind the minstrel show while still being politically correct.
The next topic I would like to touch on is that of Jewish actors in Hollywood. Since I am talking about the movie White Christmas, it seems odd that I would be thinking Jewish actors who do not celebrate Christmas. However, according to Benshoff and Griffin, "Jewish actors were encouraged to change their names to 'whiter-sounding' ones" (p. 67). One of the actors Benshoff and Griffin mention is David Kaminsky, better known as Danny Kaye, who was one of the nice young fellows dressed up as Santa Claus in the clip below.
Now I understand that in Hollywood actors and actresses often need to "act" the part of someone else, but to me this seems like a major breech of character. Not only did Kaminsky give up his name to better fit the Hollywood model, but apparently he had to give up his religion too. I guess in those days if you wanted to make it, you needed to make sacrifices, including dressing up as Santa Claus in a movie called White Christmas.
The last issue I would like to talk about is the "whiteness" of White Christmas. Benshoff and Griffin talk about the "whiteness" of Hollywood in which films are often shown from the white patriarchal standpoint. White Christmas is no exception. In fact, it is such a white film, there is only one visible character of any race besides white. Below is a clip from White Christmas where the one token black character is seen as a server on a train.
I sat down and re-watched this movie just to prove the whiteness of it when I stumbled along this one nonwhite character. I probably would never have even noticed him in this scene had I not been looking specifically for him, but now that I did see him I realized he was put there for a reason. There were hundreds of extras in this movie in restaurant scenes and dancers, yet this was the only person who resembled anything close to a nonwhite actor or actress. That lead me to believe they put him there to prove a point: they were including nonwhite actors into their film. Had they just stuck him in the background of a restaurant he would never have been noticed. But since he was a very visible, although nonspeaking, character, if only for a few seconds, they could make that claim.
It seems every good movie has a few flaws, especially some of the classics of yesterday. That won't keep me from watching them and enjoying them for their entertainment value. However, I do find myself watching these movies with a more critical eye these days to find the true meaning of what the film is trying to say.
