Stop Calling Black Actors “DEI Hires.” How The War On Diversity Is Ruining Hollywood

Hollywood likes predictability. It always has. A happy ending, a tried-and-true trope, a reliably bankable box-office star. That reliance on familiarity has often come with a reticence to change, resulting in the same faces, recycled stories, and an inevitable reliance on existing intellectual property (IP). If there’s one thing Hollywood is going to do — especially now — it’s reboot a thing from our childhoods in hopes for, what they like to call, a “built-in audience.” When casting announcements for these projects roll in, another Hollywood inevitability emerges: if the actors they announce aren’t white, there is going to be backlash, accusations that the film or TV series is “too woke,” and claims that the talent they cast are simply “DEI hires.” 

The attempt to discredit the talent and capability of actors of color, Black actors in particular, is a key tactic in the war against diversity, equity, and inclusion and we’ve seen it happen over and over again. When Leah Sava Jeffries was cast as Annabeth Chase in the Disney+ Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, the racist onslaught was swift (I just went down a Percy Jackson post-casting announcement Reddit hole and it was bleak, with racist vitriol hidden under the guise that fans “wanted a book-accurate blonde Annabeth”). When Amandla Stenberg and Jodie Turner-Smith were cast in Star Wars: The Acolyte, the series was review-bombed by bigoted trolls within the Star Wars fanbase (“There is a specific kind of Star Wars fan that’s very vocal on the internet...they’ve called our show ‘The Woke-alyte’ a fair amount – which I’m like, ‘OK, what about it?’” Stenberg said to GQ at the time). When Francesca Amewudah-Rivers was cast opposite Tom Holland in a West End revival of Romeo & Juliet last year, she faced some of the most heinous racist misogynoir I’ve ever seen on the internet. There are other examples: Laci Mosley in the iCarly reboot, the Black actors in the latest Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings series respectively, and of course, Halle Bailey in The Little Mermaid. This happens so often, I now brace myself whenever a Black actor is announced in a traditionally “white” role or in a spinoff of a vehicle that didn’t originally have Black characters. 

“The term [DEI hire] always annoys me so much because being Black — in this country especially — and growing up in predominantly white spaces, you have had to learn how to acclimate in both white and Black spaces and have had to learn how to read ‘white literature’, ‘Black literature,’ everything. Which makes you a more diverse creator, a well-versed director, writer, and actor,” says Caroline Renard, a Black woman writer and director working in Hollywood. “That person probably had to do 20 times the work to be in the position that they're in just to be considered. They’ve had to do more study and background because they already knew that the odds were up against them. We have to make sure that we're well versed in all of these things, not only in filmmaking, shows and movies from our culture, but from all cultures.”

Renard is right. As the Trump administration rolls back federal DEI initiatives and other companies (including studios like Disney, Paramount, and Amazon) have followed its lead, the fallacy that “DEI” equates to candidates being less qualified persists. People have turned the term “DEI hire” into a punchline synonymous with being lazy or unfit. But if you break down the equity part of “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” it just means leveling a playing field that has never been even. It means that people who are more than qualified finally get the opportunity to be seen for their worth. It’s insulting, frankly, to whittle down the accomplishments of Black folks who have had to overcome systems set up for them to fail and who have made it in their respective fields in spite of antiquated hiring practices, as simply undeserving tokens. It’s inaccurate, offensive, and willfully ignorant to how businesses — especially a business like Hollywood — work. 

“DEI is good for business because the central tenants of it are steeped in market competition,” Aisha Evelyna, a Toronto-based actor, writer, and filmmaker, tells Unbothered over video chat. Multiple recent McKinsey reports estimate that the entertainment industry forfeits $30 billion annually thanks to Hollywood’s inability or unwillingness to serve Black, Latine, and Asian American/Pacific Islander audiences. “It's not necessarily about hiring somebody that checks a box. It’s about having access to the best of the best, and how you know if you are truly hiring the best person for the job is if you have access to everywhere these people are hiding. Because one of the biggest barriers to entry when it comes to gaining access to employment within film and TV is networking. People work with who they know, who they like, and who they trust. The easiest thing to do when it comes to protecting Black actors in these roles is to stand up and call out these facts.” 

How do we protect Black creatives in the midst of this firestorm? That’s the big question in the face of the DEI rollbacks in the entertainment industry. Behind the scenes, white male writers are suing studios, “accusing major companies of discriminating against white, male and heterosexual workers through their diversity efforts,” according to Reuters about the case of Brian Beneker v. CBS. Nevermind the fact that white men still make up the majority of roles at the higher levels of TV employment and in feature films. While women and writers of color have made gains in the past decade, “the handful of Black creatives who are in prominent off-screen, ‘above the line’ positions (that is, creator, producer, writer, or director) find themselves primarily responsible for providing opportunities for other Black off-screen talent,” a McKinsey report states. “Unless at least one senior member of a production is Black, Black talent is largely shut out of those critical roles.”

If it’s only senior Black production members hiring other senior Black production members, but there are barely any in those positions, the cycle continues. And how we’re seeing that play out in Hollywood is that more and more, the diversity is relegated to on camera, instead of behind the scenes. And when that happens, you have less infrastructure in place to support those performers who are put in harm’s way. “They’ve got to stop doing this thing where they don’t say anything when people are getting fucking dog-piled on the internet with racism and bullshit,” Jodie Turner-Smith said to Glamour of Disney’s lack of response to The Acolyte’s racist reception (Disney has not yet responded to Unbothered’s request for comment). The passage from Turner-Smith’s Glamour profile continues: “‘It’s just not fair to not say anything. It’s really unfair… It would just be nice if the people that have all the money’ — whether that be Disney or any studio — ‘were showing their support and putting their feet down,’ she proposes. ‘Say this is unacceptable: ‘You’re not a fan if you do this.’ Make a really big statement and just see if any money leaves. I bet you it won’t, because people of colour, and especially Black people, make up a very large percentage of buying power. They might find that it’s actually more lucrative for them, but everyone’s using ‘woke’ like it’s a dirty word.’”

I’ve written before about how the word “woke” has been bastardized, co-opted, and twisted so much it has bent into a slur. The same can be said for “DEI.” Stenberg and Turner-Smith were subjected to people actively rooting for the downfall of their show — so much so that it may have impacted audience turnout (yes, the ratings were low but that’s not the full story) — simply because they dared to act while Black. Francesca Amewudah-Rivers had to spend time in every single one of her interviews post-Romeo & Juliet talking about the backlash instead of getting to focus on what her white counterparts get to discuss, things like her acting craft, or fashion, or chemistry with her co-star. “...You can’t really prepare yourself for that level of exposure. It was really difficult,” Amewudah-Rivers told Glamour. “It happened as we were just about to start rehearsals, and it was ongoing throughout the show, so it affected my whole experience.” Imagine landing your breakout role opposite one of the biggest young actors in the world, and instead of getting to revel in the joy of living your dream, you have to sit in the sorrow of a racist onslaught. "I’m reminded of the Nina Simone quote: ‘The worst thing about that kind of prejudice… is that... it feeds you self-doubt,’” Amewudah-Rivers continued. “It’s a constant battle of not feeling good enough, especially being in that room opposite Tom [Holland]. Already, I was feeling incredibly insecure.”

That quote makes me sad. It makes me sad for Amewudah-Rivers, who, by all reviews and accounts from people who saw her on the West End, is extremely talented and deserved better, but also because it felt like she was left to handle it all, in large part, alone. To this day, Holland has yet to speak out in support of his co-star. While Jamie Lloyd, the theatre company behind the production, issued a statement condemning the “barrage of deplorable racial abuse online directed towards a member of our company" and more than 800 Black actors signed an open letter (organized by playwright Somalia Nonyé Seaton) in solidarity with Amewudah-Rivers, many felt like she wasn’t protected enough — especially by the white people around her. 

Fellow actress Rachel Zegler tweeted in support of Amewudah-Rivers and revealed she texted her in an interview with Teen Vogue. “She responded and vocalized her thanks for people who stood up for her in the time where everybody was tearing her down…I think she was failed by the people around her,” Zegler said. And it’s not surprising it was another woman of color who spoke up (Zegler is Colombian). “You need to protect people when you make a vow to cast them in something where you know— you can’t act stupid, you know how the general public is going to act because they’ve been acting that way for years… You need to move quickly and make sure that she is protected. I’ve never seen such heinous things said about a person before than [I did about] her. It took absolutely nothing out of me to shoot out a tweet saying that she was my Juliet.”

A good example of this support can be found in Percy Jackson author Rick Riordan’s since-deleted blog post in support of Leah Sava Jeffries. “This post is specifically for those who have a problem with the casting of Leah Jeffries as Annabeth Chase,” Riordan wrote after the actress faced racism online. “It’s a shame such posts need to be written, but they do…Leah brings so much energy and enthusiasm to this role, so much of Annabeth’s strength. She will be a role model for new generations of girls who will see in her the kind of hero they want to be…. As strong as Leah is, as much as we have discussed the potential for this kind of reaction and the intense pressure this role will bring, the negative comments she has received online are out of line. They need to stop. Now.” Riordan named exactly what was happening to Jeffries, called out his own fandom for their blatant bigotry, and wrote, “You are judging her appropriateness for this role solely and exclusively on how she looks. She is a Black girl playing someone who was described in the books as white. Friends, that is racism.” The lengthy blog post could serve as a blueprint for how to stand on business and stand up for young actors being put in harm’s way. But as actress Sasha Compere (Love Life, MLK/X) tells me over the phone, there is a double standard when it comes to this racist backlash. 

“Are people spinning wheels over Michael B Jordan remaking The Thomas Crowne Affair? Or doing Fahrenheit 451? If not, it feels even more harrowing as a woman to see the vitriol seem to be targeted towards POC females. Period,” Compere says. “This current DEI erasure seems to target women even harder. We always had to work hard as women, let alone Black women. The racism speaks for itself in how fast corporations were to dismiss DEI, and their sighs of relief are heard more by women [of color] who have an ever higher hurdle to jump from historically patriarchal systems in the workforce.”

Black women are the harshest targets of the aforementioned racist abuse and as the industry moves away from their DEI commitments and their performative allyship, it seems like it’s only going to get worse – specifically for dark-skinned Black actresses. In the case of Amewudah-Rivers, I think it was absolutely about the fact that she is Black, but even more so that she is a dark-skinned Black woman, with braids nonetheless. The misogynoir was on full display. The excuse that the backlash was simply to preserve the integrity of the original play was just that: an excuse. And as we are undoubtedly going to see more of this in the coming years, we have to refuse to be gaslit into believing that these responses are anything but racist. 

“When people get upset about Juliet not being white, it is their attachment to whiteness that is at play, not Shakespeare,” Evelyna says. As someone who has studied Shakespeare and knows that historically Juliet has been played by people of all different races and genders and that the way the source material stays relevant is by evolving with the times. The people who had an issue with Amewudah-Rivers weren’t protecting the source material, they were safeguarding their bigotry. Evelyna also echoes the sentiment that actors need to be protected and that the blame shouldn’t fall on them when these castings go sideways, or if a project isn’t as successful as it could have been. “Star Wars is a huge franchise, and if a show fails they blame it on their Black actresses? There's empirical evidence that supports the fact that all kinds of diverse projects do well and make money. So if you can't make money off of something like that, it’s on the people who are in charge of distribution, marketing, etc. As a viewer, I call bullshit – pardon my French — and I think it's just their attachment to whiteness that they can't get over.” 

So in order for Hollywood to prove it isn’t just another American entity committed to upholding racist ideals and perpetuating white supremacist hatred, they must put their artists' well-being – especially Black artists — first. Renard agrees, but also feels like it’s a losing battle to try to fight racist trolls on the internet. “Toni Morrison said that ‘racism is a distraction. It keeps you from doing the work,’ and I see so many people who spend their entire day going back and forth with these people. Fuck these racist people. Stop giving them energy. They are who they are. You are never going to change their minds,” Renard continues, “You cannot let these people affect your work and affect what you do. But at the same time, I do think it is important. If you, as a company, are going to cast Black actors or Asian actors in certain roles, you have to say something, speak out. But we also can't let these people think they win, because for them, winning is us wasting our time.” 

Time is something many Black creatives don’t have, especially now. Post-2020, after George Floyd’s murder and the supposed “racial reckoning” in workplaces around the world, it was seen as cool, trendy, and the moral, upstanding thing to do to diversify your cast or your writers’ room. Now, it’s seen as a liability. And without mandates or societal pressures, will the opportunities for non-white creatives dry up? Yes, studios are setting up Black actors to catch heat when they are colorblind cast in IP (the Harry Potter reboot should not be happening at all, but I’m already praying for any poor Black soul who lands a lead role), but if those are the only roles available, we should be able to be in consideration. Getting hired just to fill the spot as the Black token in the cast doesn’t feel great either, but if that’s what Hollywood is going back to, Black actors may not have another choice. How do we protect Black actors while still pushing for representation? DEI didn’t solve racism in the industry, but at least it tried to course-correct decades of discrimination.  

“It’s so sad that we both need [DEI] and also feel bound by it. It’s a double edged sword,” actress Sasha Compere says. “My parents are immigrants straight from Haiti and I’m someone who got into college at a time when there was affirmative action. I know that, despite being a straight A student and all honor roll, I got into college because of affirmative action. And that’s because we didn’t have generational wealth or legacy. I don’t know how we’re going to move forward if we don’t continue to have protections for artists of color. Who’s going to fight for us?”

I don’t know the answer to that question, and that in and of itself is scary. The future isn’t completely bleak — Black pioneers in Hollywood faced an even harder uphill climb — but it’s clear that the climb is growing steeper. “Hollywood is in the midst of a flight to safety, and it often equates safety with white men,” Joy Press wrote for Vanity Fair in a story called Hollywood’s DEI Programs Have Begun to D-I-E. How Hard Did the Industry Really Try? But the piece also painted an interesting picture how how the industry will move forward when it comes to diversity. “We’re still going to think about the diversity of our workforce. For us it’s a commercial imperative. Now, are we going to say ‘Here are our 10 DEI commitments’ and call them DEI commitments, like everyone was doing? Probably not,” a senior music executive said in the Vanity Fair piece. “I think a lot of media companies will say: no, we will continue doing what we’re doing, but we’re not going to call it DEI,” the executive continued. “Because you’ve created this swirl of shit around that term.” 

Will Hollywood hide its DEI efforts under a different name? Under this administration, I’m not so sure. The pressure is swinging in the opposite direction and the vibe has shifted to the industry complying to Trump’s tyranny instead of using art to push against it. 

“Hollywood is being run by Silicon Valley Elon Musk type tech guys,” says Renard. “It's about being beholden to your board and the money men. They don't understand art. They don't understand filmmaking. They only understand numbers and the bottom line. This is why they're so obsessed with AI, because they think that machines can make them money but they don't understand the fundamentals of storytelling, filmmaking, and art. Because of that, IP is king.” Renard continues, “I don't know what's going to have to give for them to realize that audiences want new, diverse, fresh things.” 

Again, that may sound bleak, but this is where I find hope. We know what audiences want. Halle Bailey’s The Little Mermaid  grossed $298 million domestically and $569 million worldwide. Barry Jenkins’ Mufasa recently passed the $700 million mark globally. The Fast & The Furious franchise is the most diverse, and one of the highest grossing movie franchises of all time. The Keke Palmer and SZA-led Black women comedy One Of Them Days just soared at the box office. When we’re invested in, we deliver. 

That said, the fear in this moment is real. “I am doing all the right things, but I fear that my doing all the right things and working twice as hard as some of my white counterparts will not get me that far, because I am not white,” Evelyna says, her voice wobbling slightly. “A lot of Black women work twice as hard to make up the gap that is their lack of whiteness in this industry, and I fear that I am not going to be able to make up the gap.” 

While Compere is scared too, she’s also hopeful. “I feel terrified. I feel sad. I also feel inspired and motivated,” Compere says about his current moment in Hollywood. “I want to create stories for myself. I want to echo my fear about the entertainment industry, because they have not been so welcoming to POC voices in the past, I do want to state that the shift away from DEI is also a motivating period where my fellow black artists and I are working to amplify and reclaim our own voices,” she continues. “If anyone is going to fight to continue to be seen, it’s Black, Brown and our fellow POC artists. We don’t back down, we’ve always known there’s no time to waste waiting for others to open doors, so we do what we’ve always done and create for ourselves in order to be heard in the humanizing light we’ve always deserved.” 

Renard is all in on the ‘build your own structure’ approach to the future of the industry. “We do not need white people to co-sign us and to say that we’re enough and that we’re talented. We didn't need them back then. We don't need them now. And if they want to miss out on us, that's their business,” she says, getting more passionate with each sentence. “We've seen in the past that we're the dictators of culture — Black women specifically. We say what's cool. We say what's good, what's funny. We say what's interesting in fashion, music, film, TV. So I just hope that, amidst the Trump administration and the DEI rollbacks, we need to remember we never needed these people in the first place.” 

I’ll leave you with a quote Jodie Turner-Smith said to Glamour that made me sit straight up and pump my fist in the air. Like the tried-and-true Hollywood trope of a last-minute, epic monologue to save the day, Turner-Smith restored my faith that our happy ending is achievable. We’re not going anywhere. “Opinions change. What’s in vogue changes. We’re gonna get there at some point, to that place where people stop having a stick up their arse about people of color being a part of IPs that were created by white people. You know why?” Turner-Smith said. “Because we’re never going to fucking stop participating.”