MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry on ‘Star Wars’ being racist, blacks marrying Wookies
Just as Star Wars: The Force Awakens arrives in theaters, MSNBC host Melissa Harris Perry compared black people to Wookies, complaining that Star Wars is racist because Darth Vader looks like a black guy and doesn’t claim his son.
“I know why I have feelings — good, bad and otherwise — about Star Wars,” Perry explained. “…I spent the whole day talking about the Darth Vader situation.”
David Prowe (seated) was in the Darth Vader suit as the character was voiced by James Earl Jones. photo/ Brandon Jones
“The part where he was totally a black guy, whose name was basically James Earl Jones,” she said. “While he was black he was terrible and bad, awful and used to cut off white men’s hand, and didn’t actually claim his son. But as soon as he claims his son, goes over to the good, takes off his mask and he is white — yes, I have many feelings about that.”
Then Harris-Perry talked about playing with Barbies and brought poor Chewbacca into the conversation. (transcript via Mediaite)
MHP: When I was a kid, I had barbies that were African-American, and I hated Ken because he seemed wack. So I used to always marry them off to Chewbacca. And so given that you are saying…
Host Wesley Morris: Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute…
MHP: I married all my black Barbie dolls off to Chewbacca, that was to be, he was tall…
Wesley Morris: Hairy.
MHP: Hairy, kind of in control of the situation. (Horrible impression of Chewbacca’s growl)
Wesley Morris: Sub-lingual, that’s…
MHP: Yeah. And now that you are saying this is, yeah, I’m wondering about — I have concerns about my own childhood now.
David Prowse, a white Scottish actor, was actually inside the suit in the 1977 film and James Earl Jones’ voice was added in post-production.
photo/ Brandon Jones
