Rawandan-British actor Ncuti Gatwa is on the rise with roles in “Sex Education,” “Barbie,” and currently, as the lead of “Doctor Who,” the wildly popular BBC sci-fi comedy series that first aired in 1963.
Gatwa’s casting in “Doctor Who” saw the actor face an extreme level of racist backlash, reminding us all over again of the sexism that fellow “Doctor Who” alumni Jodie Whittaker experienced when she was hired to play the Doctor in 2017 (the role has mostly been portrayed by white men so far).
Gatwa is now speaking out about it all in a new interview with Attitude Magazine, talking about his experience in the industry and some of the racist double standards black actors have faced. His main gripe? The pressure that Black actors face to be excellent, which he sees as disproportionate to the “white mediocrity” that he sees on screen.
“We’re trained to be like, ‘If I’m not exceptional, I won’t be loved.’ Certainly, I think that was my thing,” Gatwa told Attitude about his experience in the film and TV industry as a Black actor. “So, yeah, I think I’m just learning now like, ‘You are allowed to be loved.’ You don’t have to be excellent or aspire to that term, ‘Black excellence.’ What the hell?”
The “Doctor Who” star continued, “There’s so much white mediocrity that gets celebrated and Black people, we have to be absolutely flawless to get half of [that] anyway. So, I’m slowly training myself out of that and being like, ‘No s***. You deserve love just for existing.’ And that has taught me to be a lot more loving as well, in a weird way.”
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Gatwa also reflected on blind casting and the hateful backlash to his casting for “Doctor Who.” While it was a struggle, he remains optimistic about the cultural sea change on the horizon.
“We do see a shift happening in casting, in positions of power, and in the status quo,” he said. “I mean, not a fast shift; things could tip over the other way a little bit quicker, but you see people kind of malfunctioning because things are changing.”
Gatwa speaking out like this certainly won’t quell any critics and will presumably only rile them up further, but his decision to speak out so boldly has likely been something he’s considered for months.
The cultural wars over this issue don’t seem like they will subside anytime soon, with online haters crying, “Go woke, go broke,” any time a character who is traditionally a white male is cast by a woman or person of color.
These racist dog whistlers are not new, really, though they have gotten louder in recent years with the advent of social media and the rising cultural left/right ideological wars. Some fans freaked out when Nick Fury and “Thor” supporting character Heimdall were played by black actors (Samuel L. Jackson and Idris Elba, respectively) in the MCU when their comic book counterparts are often illustrated as white (“Daredevil” actor Peter Shinkoda even detailed his own experiences with racisms from Joeph Loeb, the former head of Marvel Television).
As for Gatwa, he’s probably about to face a new level of abuse over these comments and he likely knows it, so good on him for speaking out regardless. Meanwhile, the new “Doctor Who” has been seemingly well-received by fandom, at least from its trailers and such, and it can be streamed on Disney+ when the new season debuts on May 10.