It's 2017,China Archives and some things just won't stand anymore. Hollywood's twisted norms are being ripped apart, from habitually silenced sexual misconduct to blatant whitewashing and irresponsible racial representation.
The last of that delightful trifecta is the subject of The Problem With Apu, a new truTV documentary about how The Simpsons' breakout caricature became the bane of an entire racial diaspora's existence.
SEE ALSO: 2015 was the tipping point for South Asians on TVThe Problem With Apustarted out as comedian Hari Kondabolu's personal vendetta against the fictional title character. Apu Nahasapeemapetilon is a recurring guest character on The Simpsons. He speaks in a thick, fabricated Indian accent, exaggerated for comedic effect by voice actor Hank Azaria.
Apu is so transcendentally offensive that a U.S. Surgeon General had to answer to impressions of the guy.
"[You're] probably thinking: 'Come on, snowflake, let it go!'" Kondabolu says in the trailer. "Well I have let it go – for 28 years."
In the documentary, he's joined by a veritable who's who of South Asian actors now prominent in American film and television: Kal Penn, Aasif Mandvi, Aziz Ansari, Hasan Minhaj, Maulik Pancholy, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Sakina Jaffrey, Aparna Nancherla – the list goes on. Seeing them all together illustrates the ubiquity of this stereotypical representation – which was, after all, the alternative to no representation at all. The film also includes interviews with former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, and it's in that moment, early on, that the absurdity kicks in.
Apu is a character so salient yet so transcendentally offensive that a U.S. Surgeon Generalhad to answer to impressions of the guy. Apu is, perversely, the one thing unifying South Asian American actors of a certain generation without fail. A visceral reaction to anything that resembled Azaria's impression may be the reason so many South Asian American actors hesitate or outright refuse to do accents in their work.
Much of the documentary – which runs about an hour in length – is devoted to tracking down Azaria for comment. It asks a lot of him that he doesn't answer for; Azaria was ostensibly an actor in need of a role, but video clips and interview snippets inform us that he never considered the lasting, damaging effects of his Apu interpretation, and neither did producers on The Simpsons.
"There are accents that...to white Americans, sound funny, period," Simpsonswriter and co-executive producer Dana Gould explains in the film (tip: This is not an explanation). An entire generation of actors and first-generation Indian Americans at large have had to double down and erase their heritage to escape the burden of this character and what he represents.
The documentary also reveals the shocking origin of Apu's name – not the last name, which is pure nonsense, but the first name, inspired by Satyajit Ray's revered Apufilm trilogy. The films – about a young man growing up in modernizing India – won awards at Cannes, the Venice Film Festival, the New York Film Festival, the British Film Institute Awards, and many more, and Simpsonscreator Matt Groenig distilled that into a shady convenience store owner.
Without the show or Azaria accepting any culpability, The Problem With Apuleaves things open-ended. The Simpsonsremains a seminal comedy in the history of American television, and Apu is part of that no matter what we do. It's up to audiences to accept the complexity of this character, of his accidental but undeniable legacy and the strides representation has taken since then – and still needs to take in the future.
The Problem With Apupremieres Nov. 19 at 10 p.m. on truTV.
Topics Documentaries The Simpsons
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