Danielle Galligan as Nina Zenik: The Real Problem
Months after the casting of Shadow and Bone has been announced I’d like to add something to the discussion about Nina’s casting.
As a young woman who is currently thin but has been 50kg more than she is now and who knows that beauty, confidence and self-respect, despite what people want us to think, are not tied to one’s weight. I was really excited to see a plus size Nina who is still the hottest and most seductive girl in the room… on that accound I was desappointed.
It’s not that I don’t like Danielle Galligan… I do. I think she has the right kind of energy to portray the character well and that’s essential.
But the real problem is not that Netflix hired a ‘thin’ actress for Nina… it’s whether she WAS viewed as a thin woman who’s merely on the curvy side.
Fan fact: Eliza Taylor from the CW’s the 100 was not wanted by the Network when she was casted because she wasn’t considered thin enough. The girl at the time was a size medium and she looked like this:
The problem is that even after all these years anything over size small is considered ‘fat’ in Hollywood and that actresses (and actors) are denied jobs because of this.
It’s 2020 and, unless there’s a point to be made from someone’s weight being on the higher scale, the body shapes that are accepted are extremely limited.
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