Gemma Chan Said ‘Anti-Aging’ Questions on ‘Captain Marvel’ Press Tour Were Sexist
Hollywood is reluctant to let actors age gracefully; sometimes, that reluctance is downright sexist. Such is the professional opinion of actor Gemma Chan, who revealed that sexism was baked into questions asked during the Captain Marvel press junket.
Sexism is par for the course, says Gemma Chan
Gemma Chan isn’t one to miss a detail, and one detail on the Captain Marvel press tour involved the number of times she –but not her male co-stars– were asked questions pertaining to age.
To support the 2019 release of the superhero adventure Captain Marvel, Chan and her co-stars embarked on a press tour during which the celebs answered thousands of questions per day. More than once, interviewers directed questions pertaining to aging to Chan but did not ask the same of her male co-stars. According to Chan, this sort of gender-specific dialogue is typical and nothing new in Hollywood.
“Discussions around aging have been a way of controlling women, making women feel insecure about ourselves and as if they aren’t adequate.”
Especially irksome to Chan are privileged people who say gender discrimination is something from the long-ago past, reported Glamour UK.
“Just because you haven’t seen it or experienced it doesn’t mean that someone else isn’t experiencing it. Just open your eyes to what is going on in the world!”
Brie Larson, Captain Marvel herself, concurs
Gemma Chan wasn’t the only Captain Marvel star who found the media tour overwhelmingly white and male. After noticing a preponderance of white male movie reviewers at her media events, Brie Larson personally selected a variety of journalists, including Keah Brown, who is Black and disabled, to her media events, reported IndieWire.
“About a year ago, I started paying attention to what my press days looked like and the critics reviewing movies, and noticed it appeared to be overwhelmingly white male. Moving forward, I decided to make sure my press days were more inclusive.”
Larson portrays the title character in Captain Marvel and is scheduled to reprise her role in 2023 in The Marvels, according to Marvel.
Rampant racism in Tinseltown?
When Gemma Chan appeared in Jon M. Chu’s movie adaptation of Crazy Rich Asians, she was 35 years old with more than a decade of credited acting experience. Much of that experience involved being overlooked for roles because her features were either too-Asian or not Asian enough. In other words, Chan was rejected from roles for racist reasons.
Sometimes, directors asked her to change her natural British accent. Although the 5’9″ actor eventually won worldwide accolades, Chan admitted that those early rejections stung.
“I’ve let it upset me, but there are other times where I can shake it off much quicker and just say, ‘That’s on them, it’s not me.’ It says much more about them and their limited world view.”
When Chan landed the supporting role of Astrid Young Teo in the contemporary rom-com Crazy Rich Asians, a successful film featuring an Asian ensemble cast was long overdue. Brushing off her former critics as ‘ignorant,’ she explained that such a film was important because it challenges and subverts people’s preconceived stereotypes.
“I think we need to constantly challenge those norms, those received ideas and stereotypes about what different people can do, what different abilities can do, right down to disabilities, social economic classes and so on. I think we need to challenge prejudice as a whole.”
Before her groundbreaking turn in Crazy Rich Asians, Chan appeared in dozens of movies and TV series, including Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, Humans, and Doctor Who. Currently, Chan has two projects in post-production, according to IMDb.
