Whiteface (performance)
Encyclopedia
- This article is about the race-related whiteface performance. For the whiteface clown, see Clown#Whiteface.
Whiteface is a form of performance in which a non-white person wears makeup in order to make themselves look like a white person, usually for comic purposes. The term is a reversal of the more common form of performance known as blackface
Blackface
Blackface is a form of theatrical makeup used in minstrel shows, and later vaudeville, in which performers create a stereotyped caricature of a black person. The practice gained popularity during the 19th century and contributed to the proliferation of stereotypes such as the "happy-go-lucky darky...
, in which performers use makeup to mimic or parody black people
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
. Whiteface performance originated in the 19th century, and today occasionally appears in cinema
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
.
Definition
The Oxford English DictionaryOxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
defines whiteface as "white or light-coloured make-up" worn "by a black actor playing a white character".
History
The earliest use of the term noted by the Oxford English Dictionary is from the New York Dramatic News in 1895, and refers to the American vaudevilleVaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
actor Lew Dockstader
Lew Dockstader
Lew Dockstader was a United States singer, comedian, and Vaudeville star, best known as a blackface minstrel show performer in the late 19th century and early years of the 20th century.Dockstader performed both as a solo act and leading a popular Minstrel troupe...
"in his new white-face act".
The OED also lists a 1947 reference to the black actor Canada Lee
Canada Lee
Canada Lee was an American actor who pioneered roles for African Americans. A champion of civil rights in the 1930s and 1940s, he died shortly before he was scheduled to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee. He became an actor after careers as a jockey, boxer, and musician...
performing the role of Bosola in The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi is a macabre, tragic play written by the English dramatist John Webster in 1612–13. It was first performed privately at the Blackfriars Theatre, then before a more general audience at The Globe, in 1613-14...
in whiteface.
The 1970 film Watermelon Man
Watermelon Man (film)
Watermelon Man is a 1970 American comedy-drama film directed by Melvin Van Peebles and based on the book The Night the Sun Came Out on Happy Hollow Lane by Herman Raucher...
begins with Godfrey Cambridge
Godfrey Cambridge
-External links:*...
playing a whiteface character, who then wakes up one morning to find himself black. Eddie Murphy
Eddie Murphy
Edward Regan "Eddie" Murphy is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, singer, director, and musician....
performed in whiteface on Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...
in the 1980s as did Dave Chappelle
Dave Chappelle
David Khari Webber "Dave" Chappelle is an American comedian, screenwriter, television/film producer, actor, and artist. Chappelle began his film career in the film Robin Hood: Men in Tights in 1993 and continued to star in minor roles in the films The Nutty Professor, Con Air, and Blue Streak. His...
on his show Chappelle's Show
Chappelle's Show
Chappelle's Show is an American sketch comedy television series created by comedian Dave Chappelle and Neal Brennan, with Chappelle hosting the show as well as starring in various skits. Chappelle, Brennan and Michele Armour were the show's executive producers. The series premiered on January 22,...
in the 2000s.
In the 1990s and 2000s, several films exploited the comic potential of black comedians donning whiteface. These performances include Lenny Henry
Lenny Henry
Lenworth George "Lenny" Henry, is a British actor, writer, comedian and occasional television presenter.- Early life :...
in True Identity
True Identity
True Identity is a 1991 American comedy film directed by Charles Lane and starring Lenny Henry, Frank Langella and Anne-Marie Johnson. The plot revolves around a black man , who disguises himself as a white man to escape the mob....
, and Shawn and Marlon Wayans
Marlon Wayans
Marlon L. Wayans is an American actor, model producer, comedian, writer, and director of movies, beginning with his role as a pedestrian in I'm Gonna Git You Sucka in 1988...
in White Chicks
White Chicks
White Chicks is a 2004 American film directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans and written and produced by Keenen Wayans, Shawn Wayans and Marlon Wayans. The film was produced by Columbia Pictures and Revolution Studios...
.
Other contexts
In pre-Reforms and Opening UpChinese economic reform
The Chinese economic reform refers to the program of economic reforms called "Socialism with Chinese characteristics" in the People's Republic of China that were started in December 1978 by reformists within the Communist Party of China led by Deng Xiaoping.China had one of the world's largest...
China, where caucasian actors were not readily available, films would often cast local actors to play foreigners for dramatic effect. By adding large prosthetic noses, red or blonde wigs, and a dusting of white paint, these actors would appear to be white. Among many other examples, Sanmao at School (三毛学生意, 1958) features a clearly-Chinese actor as a drunk and pugnacious American, and in Qixi (奇袭, 1960) drunk white-faced "American GI"s plot in garbled nonsense that approximates English. In North Korea, examples of this are still seen.