Race in Spain

This past Saturday, we went to see Hairspray, a musical that has made its way from Broadway to the big screen and now to local stages around the world, including Fuengirola, Spain. Set in 1962 Baltimore, the play is about a teenage girl, Tracy, who dreams of dancing on the Corky Collins Show. She faces adversity from her peers because of her weight, and ends up in detention with many of the Black students of her school. It is there she learns new dance moves that get finally catch the attention of Corky Collins. When Tracy gets a chance to be on the show, she decides her dream shouldn't just stop with her. Tracy believes that both Blacks and Whites should be allowed to dance on the TV, and, after ending up in jail, achieves her goal and dances along with her Black friends on the show. Not extremely original, but it's a good story and has good musical numbers. Nothing too extreme... right?

Wrong. I should have known better before I went.

My excitement about seeing the musical went from 100 to 0 in about a second, as soon as I saw the black-faced Spaniards, dressed in clothes from America of the 1960's, come on to the stage. Blackface. It's something that one very, very rarely sees in the United States (and when such an incident occurs, it usually makes national news coverage, or at least there is conversation about it), but here in Spain there is an insensitivity to the issue. Their explanation is, "But that's what they look like," and it is very hard for them to understand our construction of race, the historical struggles that took place (and are taking place) in the United States and did not unfold in the same way in Spain. Saturday's production wasn't the first time I've seen blackface in Spain: I still remember being shocked beyond words when I saw a group of about twelve girls dressed as Mammies during Carnival two years ago, with their faces painted black, not brown, black. Last time I checked there weren't any people who existed on Earth whose skin was actually black... Another common time to see black-face is on the Epiphany with the Three Kings, or Reyes Magos, come. One of the three is black, and along with the one black-faced Spaniard comes his entourage or other black-faced Spaniards... Just thinking about it makes me feel extremely upset. What upset me so much about seeing the black-face this weekend in Hairspray was that the mother did not just have her face/body painted brown, but she wore bright red lipstick and blue eyeshadow. UGH!! REALLY?!?!?! I couldn't exactly leave the theater, so I closed my eyes, breathed slowly to stay calm, and tried to not focus too much on the characters who caused me so much internal friction. I made it to the end of the performance in one piece, consoled by the fact that I knew I was going to go home and blog about it.

There is currently a debate about this going on in the United States, about blackface and theater, and how to represent people of different races when they are portrayed by actors of a different race. While I understand how perhaps this could cause managers to become perplexed, it also angers me that another solution could not be found. I remember going to a production when I was about eleven years old which was set on a plantation during slavery. I still remember very clearly the way in which race was portrayed: each cast members, despite the color of their skin, wore a felt patch on their cheek to tell the audience what race the person they were portraying was. In fact, the slave owner was a Black boy who wore a peach-colored patch on his cheek. In other words, the director cast his actors according to their talent, not to their skin color. It made the production all the more beautiful, knowing that the Black boy could be cast as the protagonist and not just a slave based on the color of his skin.

For a little information about the historical significance of Blackface, click here.