OPINION: The Cleopatra Controversy
The land of Egypt has been a source of mysticism and mystery for thousands of years, while also being a historical location marker for the Exodus of the enslaved Hebrews of the Bible. It has given us a wealth of fantasy due to much of its history and information lost to time, destroyed by thieves and vandals, or misinterpreted by rivals. You’d be hard-pressed to find Black Africans in places of prominence in Egypt, a majority Arab country that seems to hate everything African despite being located in Africa. That said, the way the rest of the world has been taught about Egypt is well-meaning parables at best, or an outright lie made up by mass-media at worst. Why am I talking about this? Because the Twittersphere has blown up about the latest Egyptian-themed movie called “Cleopatra”, with the Israeli actress Gal Gadot in the title role. Before we start talking about whether this is wrong or not, let’s look at the titular character discussed and debated: Cleopatra herself.
Cleopatra (full name: Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator) was the last active ruler of Ancient Egypt, dying by suicide before the Roman invasion in 30 BCE. She was described by the scholars at the time (and repeated by many artists and scholars since) as the most beautiful queen of the period. SIDEBAR: We’re coming back to the idea of depending on sources from antiquity for truth, but for now please proceed.
Since many of these artists were European, they depicted Cleopatra as European — despite Cleopatra being a born African. This image of Cleopatra has carried on through the ages, putting pale eyed and skinned women in the role, leading all the way up to the most common image made popular by the 1963 Cleopatra movie starring Elizabeth Taylor in the title role. This has made a lot of Black people, especially those during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and 1970s, deeply offended with good reason.
Ever since Egyptology (the study of ancient Egypt) was taught after the great discoveries of King Tutankhamen’s tomb in the early 20th Century, most school children in the Western world were taught that Egypt was in Africa and that African people were Black.
EGYPT is in AFRICA, and
AFRICA has BLACK PEOPLE, thus
EGYPTIANS are BLACK PEOPLE.
It was very simple mental math.
It went over well with a lot of Black people, who assumed that Cleopatra was an exception to White Supremacist rule: an African queen that not only was revered by the eminent power of Europe…but was also a Black woman. Unfortunately, the images did not lie when they showed Cleopatra as a White woman (as intended by their European creators), but it did not tell the whole story. As per the course for outlining world history from a Eurocentric perspective, miseducation can only advance European hegemony when faced with other cultures, and so we should work to undo them.
Let’s break this down:
- Ancient Egypt was ruled by Black African rulers for an extended period, but not always. In Cleopatra’s time, non-Black Egyptians were common, as were Egyptians with Greek ancestry known as “Egyptiotes”. The term is not new: Egyptiotes have existed since the Hellenistic period (~323 BCE) up to the 1952 Egyptian revolution when Arab nationalists finally gained control of the country and expelled many Egyptiotes.
- Cleopatra was an African, but not a black-skinned or brown-skinned African. She did not have any black- or brown-skinned African in her ancestral line. Several of her distant ancestors were brown non-Greeks: multi-great grandmother Cleopatra I Syra, Cleopatra I’s mother Laodice III of the Mithridatic Persian dynasty, and father Antiochuis III the Great was of Iranian descent. Beyond that, the ruling Ptolemaic dynasty (of which Cleopatra VII Philopator is a blood-descendant) never intermarried with the native Egyptians. This decision will factor in later.
- The Ptolemaic dynasty was descended from Ptolemy, a Macedonian (read: northern Greek) companion and historian to Alexander III the Great of Macedonia during his worldwide conquests. He was appointed satrap of Egypt after Alexander died, then declared himself full Pharaoh (calling himself Ptolemy I Soter; the “Soter” is a deific title that means “savior” in Greek…which would make Ptolemy a White savior) in 305 BC. Members of the Ptolemaic dynasty considered themselves above the native Egyptians, and would only marry those who were Greek or of a race that held high esteem in their eyes. Later Ptolemaic dynasty members followed the practice of inbreeding, along with sibling marriage, to maintain this idea while providing legitimacy by keeping the royal bloodline “pure”.
The sibling marriage practice began with Ptolemy II Philadelphus marrying his sister Arsinoe II Philadelphos, after he divorced his wife Arsinoe I. The incestuous relationships started with Ptolemy IV Philopator and his sister Arsinoe III Philopator, the first Ptolemaic queen to bear her sibling’s child. This led to genetic defects in the family line, with many members depicted as extremely obese (looking at you, Ptolemy VIII Physcon). Swollen necks and bulging eyes were prominent in a lot of depictions of Ptolemaic rulers, including the wide-eyed Cleopatra. We can only discuss what the peoples of the Ancient World must have seen and compare their accounts with what they were allowed to depict in art commissioned by the royal subjects.
Not only would the preceding points mark Cleopatra VII Philopator (aka Cleopatra) as an Egyptiot, but it also denotes she is several generations inbred (approximately 5 generations worth). Please understand this does not mean all Egyptiotes are inbred; just the Ptolemies were inbred for the purpose of this discussion. But why do we care about what Cleopatra looks like, whether she was inbred, or even her true lineage? It has a lot to do with the stories we tell ourselves and each other.
For as long as I’ve been alive, the story ancient Egypt has been told without much input from Africans (except maybe White South Africans) or without Black African presence. Most times you’ll see a Black African as a servant or slave to White actors, portraying Egyptians both inside and outside of Ptolemaic rule. Too many movies focused on White actors donning brownface to play people from Egypt, and sometimes forgoing the brownface altogether. I understand this was a barrier the Westernized film industry chose not to cross because of White supremacist preferences, but its mistakes show brightly by limiting its film cast to White people and then coloring them with tanner or adding makeup or appliances —a negative practice now recognized as “whitewashing”. We still do this, but with traditionally White characters and roles and instead cast a person of color (POC). We call this positive (and restorative) practice “color-blind casting”.
While most people know the 1963 film Cleopatra as a major example of Cleopatra’s legendary beauty as depicted by Elizabeth Taylor’s idealized Eurocentric beauty, others like Theda Bara, Vivien Leigh, Sophia Loren, Claudette Colbert, Leonor Varela, Monica Bellucci, Lyndsey Marshall, and Amy Stiller also got to play Cleopatra to varying degrees. The same can be said of other prominent female roles in African or Egyptian period pieces, like Pakistani actress Sybilla Deen, Afro-Cuban actress Gina Torres, New Zealander Josephine Davidson, multi-racial dancer Galyn Görg, Sri Lankan soprano Daniele de Niese, Lithuanian soprano Violeta Urmana, and Somalian supermodel Iman. The only actress of Egyptian descent to play Cleopatra was Amina Rizk in the 1943 film.
Please take note the list above is not exhaustive, and almost all of these women identify as White, Caucasian, or something other than African-descended (except Iman, Galyn Görg, Amina Rizk, and Gina Torres) — this is important.
The reason why Black people care about Cleopatra’s skin color is because they were told about an African queen heralded as the most beautiful and most powerful, held up as an icon in the European imagination. In a White-supremacist world, that holds a certain kind of power: you may have most of us, but you couldn’t get us all. The miseducation we’ve all been fed over the years conveniently tells us Cleopatra was being invaded and would rather die than serve under Roman rule, while also telling us the idea Cleopatra had relations (and a child!) with a man whose people came to conquer hers and then committed suicide was an act of defiance — that she operated from a position of power. This might have made sense if she saved the Egyptians from invasion with her abilities and actions, but that didn’t happen.
Because of this misinformation, many women (not just Black women) of the 20th Century have sometimes found reason to dress up as Cleopatra — by name or costume — as a sign of defiance and pride against the male-dominated world. It takes a certain level of miseducation (and/or mental gymnastics) to declare yourself a queen and then name yourself after a multi-layer burrito of bad genes to produce what would become the Roman Empire at the expense of her Egyptian subjects.
Back to the color issue: being marked as the most beautiful queen in Antiquity is prime real estate, because the most beautiful woman in Antiquity would be Helen of Troy —and despite being a princess of Sparta, she held no agency during the Trojan War as a war trophy for men like Paris, Menelaus, and Agamemnon. Helen felt the same way: it seems in any age most women want to be more than a trophy to be won. Since European society made their queens out to be less than their male rulers in the telling, and made the idea of warrior-queens like Boudicca and legendary Amazon queen Hippolyta unpopular by dint of gender norms…why not the exotic fantasy lands where their men hold no sway over White womanhood?
It is this same “innocent” invasion cloaked in a quest for “freedom” that leads many people to believe Hollywood has encroached on African history yet again without the input of Africa’s children — black and brown Africans. It’s why here are pictures of Gal Gadot in an altered version of Nefertiti’s crown side-by-side with Rihanna in the same outfit (one similar to that worn by the actress in 2017’s “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets”). It is unknown if Cleopatra wore a similar headdress.
The same people complaining about this Cleopatra movie were able to take down 2016’s “Gods of Egypt” (made by Egyptiot Alex Proyas) by not seeing it. By their actions, FOX’s 2013 show “Hieroglyph” died before seeing the light of day as people swore off the show, tanking ratings and financial predictions. But where were these people during the release of 2014’s “Exodus: Gods and Kings”? and Spike TV’s “Tut” miniseries? In the case of “Exodus”, Were these people more concerned about speaking out on a Bible movie’s “inaccurate” depiction of Egyptians when almost all the White actors with speaking roles portrayed people of color? In the case of “Tut”, was it that nobody watched it (but me) and nobody cared (but me, because of Nonzo Anozie and Kylie Bunbury)? I would never have seen “Tut” and that Ridley Scott whitewashing-fest would never have made so much money if people simply did not entertain them by partaking in the entertainment.
…and now the sidebar:
Here’s the thing about the Ancient World and historical sources from Antiquity: people in general lied to each other regularly to trick them into behaving as they wished, including historians and scholars. History books regularly point this out, because it shows up quite a bit. It’s why the North Atlantic has an ice-covered wasteland called Greenland and a green fertile paradise called Iceland: to trick raiders, unwanted immigrants, and conquerors to frozen deaths far from home.
Imagine what that would mean when these lies are applied to a woman who ruled a wealthy kingdom…which her country’s enemies of the time would carve up! These men of the Ancient World had no respect for her womanhood (let alone her royal position) and it stands to reason that the greatest insult would be to lie about her looks and lineage, as a trick to any who would ally with a woman known for marrying her siblings for power as a matter of family tradition. Due to language barriers and language drift, extended periods of time, and the unfortunate habit of humans taking nuanced information literally (not critically) and transforming it into a foundation for reason…nobody alive today remembers how the joke was supposed to go.
And just like that, Cleopatra — an inbred Egyptiot scrambling for power at the end of her reign — was transformed in the minds of some into the most beautiful and intelligent Black African Egyptian queen in Earth’s history, and later transformed in the minds of others into an unblemished White-adjacent woman whose beauty transcends the ages. See if you can spot the White supremacist patriarchal direction in the change!
If you take nothing else away from this article, know this: if you don’t like the idea of an Israeli wearing an Egyptian crown, you don’t have to see the movie. VOTE WITH YOUR WALLETS AND YOUR FEET, and the studios will get the message…perhaps actually hire an appropriate cast for the roles as written. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck complaining about the Western world changing history again through its movie studios without input from history’s descendants forever.
UPDATE (6/23/23): A new Cleopatra docu-drama series on Netflix called “Queen Cleopatra” was released in 2023, and caught a whole lot of flack. The series was cast with a brown-skinned actress of African descent—Black British actress Adele James — with Tina Garavi directing and Jada Pinkett-Smith as narrator and executive producer. When the series 5-episode run was released, Egyptians AND Europeans were mad as hornets and accused everyone involved as spreading falsehoods about Egypt…namely the idea that Cleopatra wasn’t a Black person and a Black person should not have been cast to play the role. The covers were pulled off as they complained, because the majority of the opponents’ arguments rests there. Egyptian opponents of the production wanted ALL of Netflix blocked in Egypt for violating Egyptian media laws over casting a Black woman to play Cleopatra. The Greeks got in on it, asking why a Greek woman was not cast to play a Greek. Controversy had spread across the Web as many people have gone to great lengths to denounce this docu-drama:
- The phrase used by lawyer Mahmoud al-Semary in his argument to shut down Netflix was its platform was “promoting Afrocentric ideas.”
- Cairo’s former antiquities minister Zahi Hawass called the documentary “completely fake. Cleopatra was Greek, meaning she was light-skinned, not black.” He continued “Netflix is trying to provoke confusion by spreading false and deceptive facts that the origin of the Egyptian civilization is black.”
- Scientists across Europe have provided even more evidence to refute the claim of a Black African Cleopatra, pulling out every DNA strand to prove that Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator is a light-skinned Macedonian Greek woman.
- Like clockwork, lots of critics had their hot takes and bashings so they could get those treasured views and clicks. Some Black people got in on it too, but they do not represent ALL Black people in any one country. Remember: not all skinfolk is kinfolk.
It stands to reason the entire push for all detractors to deny Cleopatra (or nearly any Egyptian royal save the Nubian dynasties) the ability to be Black is based in fundamental racism against dark-skinned Sub-Saharan African people and their descendants (as listed above), but there is more to this issue. It goes beyond the pale (pun intended) and lays bare the sentiments of an Arab-controlled Egypt and its push to be considered White-adjacent for beneficial and upward social mobility on the global stage. From what I’ve seen and read about the controversy and the responses to the responses, no one wants to have that conversation.
Perhaps the problem is dark-skinned Sub-Saharan African-descended people, particularly the American ones: as perennial victims for a minimum of 400+ years, anything not Black and with us…is White and against us. But what was the designation “White”, other than a unifying tribal moniker to stop Europeans from killing each other wholesale over European territory? More people without a trace of European blood and no pale skin join the White tribe every day with just as many “White” people being rejected or cast out from the tribe, for any number of reasons or no reason at all. Joining the tribe requires every non-”White” recruit to join social circles with new responsibilities and ideologies— many of which run contrary to the recruits’ collective health and survival. Why would anyone want to be a part of this hoary, violent history or defend the tribe’s hypocritical belief that demands some live while others die? These dangerous ideas are one of the many reasons why most marginalized people still have problems with social ostracism and White supremacy in the world: it’s built on the bones of the “other” and designated “lessers”, and those that benefit make a point to not acknowledge or outright deny or misrepresent history and its actors. It’s why all those people of color criticizing the Netflix Cleopatra docu-drama laugh and smile as they curse the show: they’re earning easy points to join the White tribe and participate in the hypocrisy. They want to be “White” too — it’s safer, cleaner, and the grass is greener where the resources are hoarded. It’s a goal to move to one unified (and blended!) tribe at the cost of all others, and you can’t blame these marginalized folks for wanting better than what they have.
I have to agree with these detractors one one thing: Cleopatra does not have to be Black. The Last Pharaoh of Egypt can be played by ANY race cast (even if it is a Black person cast) because the world has allowed an Afro-Cuban, a Pakistani, a Chilean, a Maori New Zealander, a Lithuanian and even an Egyptian play this role without incident or claim to historical accuracy. I am looking forward to the day an East Asian performer plays the role.
I will end this update on two quotes:
- “If you don’t like the casting, don’t watch the show.” — Adele James, regarding the Cleopatra backlash, which mirror my own above the break
- “You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks.” — Winston Churchill
