Hey guys, semi-serious post here but it’s also about a fun fandom idea so I’d appreciate if you’d give it a read…!
So, Netflix announced a while back that they were going to pick up A Series of Unfortunate Events as a tv show (!!!) that would be the entire story, rather than just the beginning, like the 2004 film adaptation. Lots of people were really excited about this !! The book series is really important to a lot of people for a lot of reasons and seeing it adapted visually all the way through is really exciting!
I was hoping that Netflix would also use this as an opportunity to fix some of the problems that were in the film adaptation, which, to remind u, was made twelve entire years ago.
In the film, Jim Carrey was given an ENORMOUS prosthetic hooknose, in order to designate him as the villain character.
Never, anywhere in these books, is it mentioned that Count Olaf has an enormous hooknose. The illustrator, whose work I otherwise think is very good, chose to give the character this trait. While it’s true that therefore the film did not CREATE hooknosed Olaf, they were perfectly able to make a decision not to do the same thing in their film, and instead they chose to have a gentile wear a Fake Jew Nose. That was a deliberate design choice they made.
Today photos of Neil Patrick Harris in Olaf makeup were released online. When I saw them I immediately felt punched in the gut.
12 full years after the film, Netflix has chosen, again, to designate villainousness with a huge Fake Jew Nose.
Again, and again, and again, people keep actively making this design choice.
ASOUE is a book series written by a Jewish man, about strongly Jewish-coded protagonists (they have been confirmed as Jewish by the author in interviews as well). That everyone who visually adapts this story feels the need to make this arbitrary design choice, based on NOTHING that is in the text, is… it’s a punch in the gut! And the face! And additionally, a punch in the centuries of oppression.
Here’s what I want to do: I want to fight back. I want to fill the internet with images of the Baudelaires WITH big hooknoses. Explicitly semitic-looking Baudelaires. A TON OF THEM. Obviously not “offensive stereotype” levels, to clarify (I think this is obvious but it can’t hurt to make sure), but identifiably semitic.
I’m going to start doing this and posting my designs and drawings, and I’d love if other people would join me! I want this to be a positive thing, I want it to be fun and joyous and interactive and I want, most of all, to make a little place on the internet for images in which the Jewish characters in this book written by a Jewish man, look more like Jews than the villain does.
Please feel free to participate in this as much and in whichever ways you want to, and also feel free to participate in reblogging this post and the resulting drawing as much as you like, even if you’re not doing art for it! This is going to be friendly and fun and I hope we can make some connections with each other.
I’m going to be tagging this and all my own drawings with “Jewish Baudelaires Project” && I hope other people will use that tag too so we can all see & share everything!
This got longer than I intended so if you got this far, thanx for hanging in there, & I hope to see you around the tag and am excited to see what everyone’s designs will look like! :D
origamiaround
andulkaphoto
areudirty
germansingergirl
kianamaiart
