A dozen Native American actors have walked off the set of Adam Sandler‘s new movie, The Ridiculous Six, in protest of racist and offensive jokes.
The movie is a spoof of The Magnificent Seven, and stars Nick Nolte and Vanilla Ice.
The actors spoke to Indian Country Today, and explained their protest:
“The examples of disrespect included Native women’s names such as Beaver’s Breath and No Bra, an actress portraying an Apache woman squatting and urinating while smoking a peace pipe, and feathers inappropriately positioned on a teepee.”
One actor, Loren Anthony, was at first excited about the project, as he had agreed to do the movie because the production company had hired a cultural advisor to make sure Native American culture was portrayed tastefully. He was first insulted when the movie costumes that were supposed to portray Apache, but instead looked significantly more like Comanche. And the jokes were just as insulting:
“One thing that really offended a lot of people was that there was a female character called Beaver’s breath. One character says ‘Hey, Beaver’s Breath.’ And the Native woman says, ‘How did you know my name?’ … They just treated us as if we should just be on the side. When we did speak with the main director, he was trying to say the disrespect was not intentional and this was a comedy.”
Netflix issued a statement to TMZ about the actor walk-off, saying that the Native American actors are in on the the joke, because it really seems that way.
“The movie has ridiculous in the title for a reason: because it is ridiculous.” The rep says it’s intended to be a satire of traditional Westerns and the stereotypes popularised from the genre. They also added that the diverse cast “is not only part of — but in on — the joke.”
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