Prateek Tanmay
Billionaire businessman Elon Musk may have his own reasons of calling out Christopher Nolan’s “anti-white racism” for casting Black actor Lupita Nyong’o as the Helen of Troy in his upcoming ancient epic The Odyssey, a film adaptation of the text by ancient Greek poet Homer. But his concerns of the lack of Greek representation in the film have now found resonance in people from Greece itself.
A guest contributor in the Greek City Times called out Nolan’s ignorance of their people in a recent open latter. “Greek people did not disappear after the age of myth. Greek culture was not frozen in classical marble. Greek language was not extinguished in antiquity. We are still here,” they wrote, adding, “For more than 3,000 continuous years, Greek identity has persisted through transformation rather than disappearance.”
“At every stage, something essential remained unbroken: language, memory, and cultural continuity. Greek is still spoken today, the oldest continuously surviving language in Europe. Not reconstructed. Not revived. But lived. That continuity matters when stories like The Odyssey are retold,” the author argued. But the letter also clarified that “we are not arguing against diversity, nor against reinterpretation,” but “when Greek stories are retold on a global stage, Greek people are not rendered invisible within them.” It further asserted, “Greece is not only a setting in antiquity. It is a living country. Greek people are not historical figures. We are contemporaries.”
In conclusion, the letter pointed out that while Hollywood kickstarted the conversation around diversity in cinema, the Greeks deemed it important to underline that the diversity needs to be extended to their culture as well. “We Greeks didn’t start this fire. Hollywood did, when it started banging on its self-righteous drum of diversity…pontificating about authenticity. We decided to expose the hypocrisy by dancing to that drum beat! This magazine believes in free cultural trade and not cultural protectionism – but not at our expense,” it added. Nolan has also enjoyed rebates for shooting extensively in Greece.
Matt Damon plays Odysseus in The Odyssey.
Elon Musk’s issues with The Odyssey
Musk, who’s neither Greek nor involved in filmmaking, last month repeatedly called out Nolan and The Odyssey for its casting, particularly of Lupita as the Helen of Troy. Claiming on his social media platform X that Nolan “grossly insulted the Greek people,” he argued, “I agree (with Nolan) that she (Lupita) is beautiful, but casting a Black woman to play a White woman in a foundational work of European literature is no more right than casting a White man to play Shaka Zulu,” referring to the legendary leader of the largest ethnic group of South Africa.
Further dubbing Nolan as “an anti-White racist”, Musk alleged that the Oscar-winning filmmaker is making his cast inclusive only to meet the DIE (Diversity, Inclusion, Equality) criteria of the Academy Awards. He claimed Nolan “desecrated the Odyssey so that he would be eligible for an Academy Award”, and then even attacked the intent behind the DIE eligibility criteria. “Who specifically is the as*hole who added DEI lies to Academy Awards eligibility instead of it just being about making the best movie?,” he added.
Lupita Nyong’o has been cast as the Helen of Troy in The Odyssey.
Did Nolan cast Lupita to qualify for the Oscars?
However, a number of cinema experts have dismissed Musk’s far-fetched and rather superfluous claims regarding the Academy’s diversity criteria. They argued that these criteria are so lenient that even a film with an all-white cast can easily quality for the awards race, given there’s even a basic level of diversity in its crew.
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As per The Academy’s official website, a film needs to meet only two of the four diversity criteria mentioned to be eligible for running:
- A lead or significant supporting actor from an underrepresented racial or ethnic group, or a 30% ensemble drawn from two underrepresented groups, or a storyline centered on one.
- Department heads, broader crew, or 30% crew composition.
- The distribution or financing company’s paid apprenticeships and training.
- In-house senior executives or consultants across the company’s development, marketing, publicity and distribution.
Thus, The Odyssey would easily qualify, given its co-producer, Emma Thomas, is a woman, counted as an underrepresented minority by the Academy. Universal Pictures, which is distributing the film, also ticks enough boxes to meet the eligibility criteria. Musk hasn’t responded to this rebuttal yet.
Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is slated to release in cinemas worldwide on July 17.
Lupita’s response to her casting
While Nolan has also not commented on Musk or the Greeks’ contentions with his casting, Lupita has responded to the former. “I’m very supportive of Chris’s intention with it and with the version of this story that he is telling. Our cast is representative of the world. I’m not spending my time thinking of a defence. The criticism will exist whether I engage with it or not,” she told Elle last week.
After her comments, Lupita’s comments on playing Nakia in Chadwick Boseman’s Marvel franchise Black Panther have resurfaced. “I’m all about the demystification of the African continent. Oftentimes the African continent, when it’s portrayed in cinema, it’s very general. And we were all hell bent on it not being general,” she told BBC in 2018.
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“Hopefully there is a celebration as a result of respect for these very wealthy and diverse cultures that often just get washed as one thing,” she added. Now that she’s been cast as the Helen of Troy in The Odyssey, the Greek people are demanding exactly what she did with Black Panther — a place in their world’s depiction on the big screen.
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Produced by Nolan and Thomas’ Syncopy Inc, The Odyssey also stars Matt Damon as Odysseus, Tom Holland as Telemachus, Anne Hathaway as Penelope, Robert Pattinson as Antinous, Zendaya as Athena, Charlize Theron as Calypso, Jon Bernthal as Menelaus, Benny Safdie as Agamemnon, and Himesh Patel as Eurylochus among others. The first-ever film to be completely shot in IMAX, it is slated to release in cinemas worldwide on July 17.
