Conservative pick-me Candace Owens caught heat on Twitter after claiming that Black actress Jodie Turner-Smith was an appropriate pick for lead in a new miniseries highlighting Anne Boleyn’s life. The staunch Republican commentator made an absurd comparison of Turner-Smith’s portrayal of a white woman to white entertainers’ ability to portray Black figures.
“I’m actually totally fine with Jodie Turner playing the role of Anne Boleyn so long as the radical left promises to keep their mouth shut if in the future Henry Caville is selected to play Barack Obama and Rachel McAdams can play Michelle. Not double standards- K?” she wrote.
Owens’ asinine tweet
was met with disdain, facts and hilarity.Anne Boleyn aired on Channel 5 on June 1. Turner-Smith’s spoke about her portrayal of Boleyn in the three-part miniseries with the Radio Times in May.
“It’s much more approachable and appealing to a contemporary audience when you cast this way because we are distilling this down to a human experience,” the actress explained. “If you ask anyone to watch a film or to observe any art, you are asking them to suspend their beliefs.”
She added: “I am aware it’s going to be a stretch for some people because they will feel too distracted by that, but I think for a lot of other people who are finally ready to see the world in a different way, they’re going to see that this is a human story we are telling, and a fascinating one at that.”