10 Worst Examples Of Hollywood Whitewashing

3. Various White Guys As The Entire Egyptian Pantheon (Gods Of Egypt, 2016)

The Ancient One
Summit Entertainment

Egyptian mythology is fascinating and complex, with a broad range of gods and situations to draw upon, so Alex Proyas had a potentially great concept on his hands with Gods of Egypt. Too bad he fluffed it in almost every respect. Not only did the film go beyond so-bad-its-good into so-bad-its-unrelentingly-dull, but it trainwrecked its own marketing campaign with its controversial casting.

Who should play Set, the Egyptian God of Darkness? An Egyptian actor? No, Gerard Butler, of course, is perfect to shout his way through this nonsense! Other gods were played by Nicolas Coster-Waldau, Geoffrey Rush, and Rufus Sewell, who could all do much better, and who, in case you haven’t noticed, are all white. Even the main human character, Bek, was played by white guy Brenton Thwaites, while the one black actor, Chadwick Boseman, felt awkwardly token.

When other high-budget films have made similar casting misjudgments, their creators have sometimes claimed they needed big name stars to draw in the viewers, such as when Ridley Scott cast Christian Bale as Moses in Exodus: Gods and Kings. But Gerard Butler? Really?

Contributor
Contributor

Kieron is a human male from the planet Earth. By day he writes for various publications, including WhatCulture, Starburst, Doctor Who Adventures, and Campfire Graphic Novels, and edits The Big Picture. By night he's either asleep or watching Netflix, depending on what time he has to get up in the morning.