When Ashton Kutcher starred in a Popchips ad four years ago, he wore brownface makeup and put on a fake Indian accent to pose as a Bollywood producer named Raj.
Kutcher’s Popchips ad appeared in an opening montage in episode four of the Netflix series Master of None, along other Indian stereotypes in TV and film, like Apu from the Kwik-E-Mart in The Simpsons and a merchant from Indiana Jones who eats “chilled monkey brains.”
The episode, titled “Indians on TV” features Aziz Ansari’s character Dev, grappling with his life as an Indian actor living in New York City. As someone whose claim to fame is a Go-Gurt commercial, Dev auditions for various roles, only to find that most acting gigs for Indian actors are generic, nameless stereotypes – an Indian buffet restaurant employee, a convenience store clerk, or the role of “unnamed cab driver.”
“Why can’t there be a [character] just once who’s like, an architect, or he designs mittens, or does one of the jobs Bradley Cooper’s characters do in movies?” Dev asks at one point.
This Thursday, Feb. 18, the University of Oregon Students of the Indian Subcontinent will host a screening of two Master of None episodes – “Parents” and “Indians on TV” – at 6 p.m. in Living-Learning Center Room 123. The showing will be followed by a discussion about the show’s portrayal of first-generation Asian-American experience and how it sheds light on commonplace stereotypes in film and television.
In a column for The New York Times, Ansari discusses the “Indians on TV” episode and cites a few stats about the lead acting roles going to non-white actors in film and TV. In 2013, the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies at the University of California in Los Angeles, only 16.7 percent of lead film roles were assigned to minorities. In broadcast TV, 6.5 percent of lead roles were going to minorities in 2012-13. In cable TV, minorities were hired for 19.3 percent of the roles.
“When I first watched [Master of None] I was amazed at how much I related to some of the scenes depicted,” said group member Meghna Agarwal in an email. “Most American media doesn’t actually depict or relate to my experience as an American, so this show was kind of a revelation.”
The episode “Indians on TV” drew especially high praise for its pointed skewering of the film and TV industry and its xenophobic acting protocols. Not only are Dev’s acting roles being typecast as nonspecific personas, but there’s seldom more than one Indian character in a show or movie and more often than not, an Indian actor will employ a stereotypical accent, or else white actors are hired to play Indian characters.
“Every show has two white people,” Dev says as he laments how rare it is to find Indians on television programs, and how putting two Indian characters on a TV show’s poster would automatically make it an “Indian show.” “People don’t watch True Detective and say, ‘Ooh, there’s that white detective show.’”
Agarwal said that the student group picked Master of None to engage in a discussion with international students, first-generation Americans and other members of the community.
“The show caused a lot of buzz in the South Asian community when it came out because it challenges a lot of stereotypes and it really speaks to a lot of our experiences in America,” said Agarwal. “We are not all math geniuses, doctors, terrorists, spiritual guides and kung fu masters!”