Samantha Akkineni trolled for fake ‘brown face', The Family Man creators Raj & DK react

The creators of the show, Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK have a sharp response to the criticism against Samantha Akkineni for her fake ‘brown face' in The Family Man season 2

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Samantha Akkineni

The much talked about web series The Family Man Season 2 continues to attract controversies one after the other. After backlash and calls of ban from religious groups, the leading actress Samantha Akkineni was trolled for her fake ‘brown face' in the show.

Samantha Akkineni essays the role of Raji, the Sri Lankan Tamil rebel who takes on Manoj Bajpayee's Srikant Tiwari in season two. 

The creators of the show, Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK have reacted to criticism with a sharp response. In an interview with Film Companion, the makers stated that they did not go on to paint the actress’ face brown in context of beauty but only in service of the character.

Raj told Film Companion, "This whole thing comes in the context of beauty, when you're trying to say dark skin is not beautiful and fair skin is beautiful... This is not that context, number one. There is no context of skin beauty in this. We are all shades of brown. Now, the idea is that if each one is a shade of brown, so it's not about getting a different race to play this (character). It's not a race thing either. These are the two contexts where it should be looked down upon, and that's where the main problem is. And we are well aware of it; it's not like we are irresponsible filmmakers, to propagate something of that kind."

He added, "Here, we are trying to get the character of Raji right. We want her to speak it, we want her to look it, we want her to be that action girl who can land the punch; someone who can be physically fit and take on a guy double her size. That's our main challenge. So if you look at what she wears... She's a soldier, she's a weather-beaten girl, there's no time for worrying about self-care. If you're a solider in the Himalayas, your face is going to be red, that's the makeup."

https://www.instagram.com/p/CPtC88Jrh5O/?utm_medium=copy_link

DK said, "In a way, it's the character, right. And the character demanded that she had to be fit, because she's a military person. And what did Samantha do for the role? She actually trained. For three months she did intense training and got these biceps. She learned martial arts from the choreographer, and took classes, and that's why the action is good. She learned this particular dialect of Tamil, which is not her usual Tamil. Now add to that the concept of hair, makeup and costume, that is the complete character that we are presenting. This is the character of Raji; she looks a certain way, she walks a certain way, and she's a killing machine, and that's all there is to it."

Earlier after the release of the trailer, Rajya Sabha MP Vaiko had written a letter of complaint to Information and Broadcasting Minister, Prakash Javadekar seeking a ban on ‘The Family Man Season 2’ stating that the trailer depicts Tamilians as terrorists and ISI agents having links with Pakistan.

Directed by Raj & DK , the Family Man S2 features Manoj Bajpayee, Priyamani, Samantha Akkineni and Sharib Hashmi among others in lead roles.

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Comments (2)

LMAO they contradict their own idiotic logic. Bollywood / Indian TV can never look past skin tone & nor can it be used as an excuse for anything. Only exceptions if the character is supernatural (ie red/blue/etc skin tone)

2 years ago

Acha? Then hire characters that are actually that complexion? The "darkest" actors we have ever gotten are Bipasha Basu, Rani Mukherjee, and Radhika Apte. Maybe even Konkana. Even then these actors complexion is fairly light. Gosh bollywood will do anything but discuss actual colorism with their system.

2 years ago

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