The streaming giant says the comedy titled 'The Ridiculous Six' is 'a broad satire of Western movies and the stereotypes they popularized.'
- April 24, 2015
AceShowbiz -
Native American actors walked off the set of Adam Sandler's movie "The Ridiculous Six", which is produced for Netflix, on Wednesday, April 22. The Indian actors claim they were offended by racist jokes that crossed the line.
Netflix, however, says the outraged actors were missing the joke. In defense of the movie, the streaming giant says in a statement, "The movie has 'ridiculous' in the title for a reason: because it is ridiculous. It is a broad satire of Western movies and the stereotypes they popularized, featuring a diverse cast that is not only part of -- but in on -- the joke."
On the other hand, Loren Anthony, one of the actors who felt insulted by jokes in the movie, says, "I was asked a long time ago to do some work on this and I wasn't down for it. Then they told me it was going to be a comedy, but it would not be racist. So I agreed to it but on Monday things started getting weird on the set."
Anthony, who had been sharing pictures from the set and said he had a good time shooting the movie before the walking off incident, goes on detailing, "We were supposed to be Apache, but it was really stereotypical and we did not look Apache at all. We looked more like Comanche. One thing that really offended a lot of people was that there was a female character called Beaver's breath. One character says 'Hey, Beaver's Breath.' And the Native woman says, 'How did you know my name?' "
"They just treated us as if we should just be on the side. When we did speak with the main director, he was trying to say the disrespect was not intentional and this was a comedy," he adds.
Another actor, Allison Young, says they also talked to producers, but they were told, " 'If you guys are so sensitive, you should leave.' " She recalls her reaction to the producers' response, "I was just standing there and got emotional and teary-eyed. I didn't want to cry but the feeling just came over me."
Goldie Tom echoes the sentiment, "I felt this was all really disrespectful. Our costumes did not portray Apache people. The consultant, Bruce spoke to the crew and told them we should not have braids and chokers and he was very disappointed. He asked to speak with Adam Sandler. We talked to the producers about other things in the script and they said 'It's in the script and we are not going to change it.' Overall, we were just treated disrespectfully, the spoke down to us and treated everyone with strong tones."
"The Ridiculous Six" is directed by Frank Coraci with the script written by Adam Sandler and Tim Herlihy. Other stars supporting the movie include Will Forte, Taylor Lautner, Steve Buscemi, Danny Trejo, Terry Crews, Luke Wilson, Nick Nolte and Rob Schneider.
