Murder by Death (1976) coming from Shout

[RCRochester]

Originally Posted by Rockercub

I haven't seen it in years, but this is my question. Is it problematic (and come on, you have to admit that yellowface is problematic) in and of itself or is it a comment on the problematic source material? I've been waiting for a sale to pick up the blu-ray, but I think I might just have to grab it. I'm curious now.

With respect to this "issue" there are two separate things to point out.

First, the character that Peter Sellers plays in the film is a parody of Charlie Chan who, traditionally in the old movies, was always played by a white actor while his various sons who assisted him were always played by authentic Asian actors. That aspect is also spoofed here with Richard Narita playing his son and jokes are made based on the fact that Wang is Chinese and his son is Japanese (until it's pointed out he is adopted).

Secondly, for many decades and at the time this film was made it was not seen as that big of a deal for white actors to play non-white characters. Peter Sellers did it often and, in fact, his very last movie had him playing Fu Manchu. Five years after Murder By Death, Peter Ustinov played Charlie Chan in Curse of the Dragon Queen.

I realize that by today's standards it's something that is frowned upon but back then people didn't consider it "racist" for a white actor to do that, it was simply an actor playing a character and wearing makeup to complete the look of the character. These portrayals were not comparable to early 20th century blackface that one would associate with minstrelsy so nobody associated them with the same sort of negative connotations.