I had been discussing the influences behind SotS's animated segments (minstrelsy, Amos 'n' Andy) a while back but got overly intense and was a bit of a jerk. I'll repeat my thoughts more politely. Minstrelsy was probably the largest form of entertainment in America from the early 19th through the early 20th century. It's more than blackface; it had tropes and characters and songs. Two of the characters were Zip C**n and Jim Crow. Zip was a dandy who used big words and spoke fast but was, under it all, just another idiot. Jim was a total idiot, lazy, useless.
Br'er Fox is Zip, Br'er Bear is Jim. Br'er Fox even has a vest and hat which I believe reference Zip (Marc Davis was definitely aware of this form of art. I don't believe he was hateful or anything, I quite like him. But he had a vast knowledge of the arts). If those connections are a little tenuous, the voice acting should cement it. Yes, all of the voice actors were black, and Baskett especially is really really good at it. But. These actors were all bringing with them a history with Amos 'n' Andy that informed their performances. In that show they were made to imitate white people that had performed those characters on the radio. The characters were, originally, meant to mock black people. The dialects are not black dialects, they are minstrel dialects. And Splash Mountain features them too. That is my one issue with the ride. Could it have been changed without PatF? Yeah, just have new voices. Fixes most of it.
SotS will always be a stain until Disney acknowledges it, treats it as a mistake that requires forgiveness, and moves forward.
I agree that if most people my age (I'm 24) watched TCM as often as I do the phone lines would probably be on fire.
Let me preface this be apologizing for my original reply to this post. It was snarky and not at all helpful to the discussion.
Disney’s Brer Fox and Brer Bear are based on the Fox and the Bear from the folklore. The fox thinks he’s smarter than he really is. He shows moments of brilliance (he catches the Rabbit often) but falls for the tricksters tricks. I’ve also been told he has elements of the Coyote from the Indigenous tales. The bear is gullible but has great force. I’m sure we’ve all met many Brer Foxes and Brer Bears in our life, not specific to any skin color or background, but rather in personality.
I think the complaints about the dialect and voice are somewhat justified. It seems like this is the aspect that make people the most uncomfortable about the film. Many try to come up with contrived reasons or theories on why the film is bad, but the explanations always come back to the voices. I get it. It’s
probably exaggerated. To what degree, I don’t know, and I’m sure most arguing it don’t know either. I’d love to know, with something to back it up. Naturally, the dialect was heavily modified for the ride. Perhaps not enough, that might have been a wise change last year (including giving Brer Rabbit a black voice).
The era in which SotS was made was an era in which many black actors had “unflattering” roles by today’s standards. Thankfully, we are in a much better era today. However, I don’t think it is right to place the blame of the past era on Johnny Lee, James Baskette, and Nick Stewart, all of which gave an amazing performance. Nor should we place the blame on the characters that predate Disney and the voices by a significant amount of time.
A lot of people seem to be claiming that these characters come from minstrelsy. Not sure where this is coming from, but it isn’t quite accurate. There are, however, rooted in slavery. But this is where the context matters. These were the stories that gave the black Americans hope. They were the Brer Rabbits. They didn’t always want to resort to his trickery, but they did when they had to. They were so much smarter than the white people that looked down upon them (The Brer Foxes and the Brer Bears). I think it’s a shame that we only seem to care about their tragedies rather than their triumphs. Their messages and stories are still something we all need to learn from. The more time that passes, the more I realize that they were the smartest of them all.
