The new movie Licorice Pizza is facing backlash for scenes in which a white male character speaks with an offensive fake Asian accent.
The film was written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, the eight-time Oscar-nominated filmmaker behind movies like Boogie Nights, There Will Be Blood, The Master, Inherent Vice, and Phantom Thread.
Licorice Pizza is the story of Alana Kane (Alana Haim) and Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman) growing up, running around and falling in love in the San Fernando Valley, 1973. The film tracks the treacherous navigation of first love.
Click inside to find out what happens in the controversial scenes…
In the movie, Pitch Perfect actor John Michael Higgins plays a restauranteur who owns an establishment with his Japanese wife. He speaks to her with a fake Asian accent that is being called out as racist. The character appears a second time, this time with a second Japanese woman and he repeats the fake accent with her.
David Chen, the host of podcast “Culturally Relevant,” tweeted, “Picture this: You’re watching LICORICE PIZZA. It’s brilliant. Then, early on, a buffoonish character drops an Asian caricature. The (mostly white) audience laughs. And now, you gotta think about that laughter the rest of the film. Did you picture it? Because it f–king sucks.”
Director and screenwriter Karen Maine tweeted, “I saw #LicoricePizza over a week ago and it’s taken me this long to process it. There’s an incredibly racist, seemingly pointless (other than a cheap laugh, which it got at the screening I was at) scene that mocks Asian accents.”
Read more tweets below…
Picture this: You’re watching LICORICE PIZZA. It’s brilliant.
Then, early on, a buffoonish character drops an Asian caricature. The (mostly white) audience laughs. And now, you gotta think about that laughter the rest of the film.
Did you picture it? Because it fucking sucks.
— David Chen (@davechensky) November 19, 2021
I saw #LicoricePizza over a week ago and it’s taken me this long to process it. There’s an incredibly racist, seemingly pointless (other than a cheap laugh, which it got at the screening I was at) scene that mocks Asian accents.
— Karen Maine (@karen__maine) November 22, 2021
LICORICE PIZZA is great but I was reminded that it has extremely uncomfortable scenes with a white man speaking in the most obscenely offensive mock Asian accent to his Asian wife. Cringe was unbearable. Cringe at the scene but also at the theater full of white people laughing.
— Henry Ahn 안위현 (@thehenryahn) November 24, 2021
Damn, can’t us Asians ever have anything nice? Some of my fav white male Directors: PTA, Wes Anderson, Denis Villeneuve all have been making real amazing films lately and then there’s a fake Asian accent or a sneaky Asian character trope. Let it end. https://t.co/CYqNZLSbXi
— so⁷ ♡✨ (@ssoyunum) November 25, 2021
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