Before there were flames on the side of Madeline Kahn's face in Clue, Peter Sellers was doing full-on yellowface in the Robert Moore's whodunit? Murder By Death -- and we talked to singer, dancer, actor, and RuPaul's Drag Race icon Peppermint all about it!

Set up as a send up of the "old dark house" genre, the film had an incredible cast including the aforementioned Sellers in yellowface; the OG Obi-Wan , Alec Guinness; queen Maggie Smith; Columbo -- I mean, Peter Falk, the Bride of Frankenstein Elsa Lanchester; Eileen Brennan, who also starred in Clue as well as literary legend Truman Capote and James Cromwell in his first feature role!

It's a stacked cast -- and the movie is super-duper fun -- but the way they lean into the yellowface of it all makes it problematic, obviously. The movie also handles its female characters very interestingly and the real Asian who stars in the movie, Richard Narita, deserves some sort of award for having to act opposite Sellers' yellowface. There is also some queerness that manages to find its way in there as well as bizarre representation of people with disabilities.

Murder By Death is wild and Peppermint and Dino had a grand ol' time unpacking all of it!

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Peppermint

Instagram: ⁠@Peppermint247

Twitter: ⁠@Peppermint247

Dino-Ray Ramos (@dinoray on ⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠) serves as host and producer of Problematic Fave. Brian Aguilar (@bee.rhi on ⁠Instagram⁠) also serves as producer and editor of Problematic Fave.

DIASPORA: ⁠thediasporatimes.com; ⁠@realdiaspora on ⁠Twitter⁠, ⁠Instagram⁠

Marginal MediaWorks: @mrgnlmedia on ⁠Instagram⁠

Send your "problematic faves" to ⁠thisisdiaspora@gmail.com⁠ and we'll share them on the pod with our guests!

If anything, the biggest takeaway from this episode of Problematic Fave with stand-up comedian and writer Dylan Adler (The Late Late Show with James Corden) it's that Tai Lung, the villain in Kung Fu Panda, is giving masc top energy and is a queer icon.

In this week's episode, we talk about the the 2008 animated feature starring Jack Black and Angelina Jolie and as delightful as it is, this classic is giving Orientalism for the children!

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Dylan Adler

Instagram: @dylanadler_

Twitter: @DylanAdler6

dylanaadler.com

Dino-Ray Ramos (@dinoray on ⁠Twitter⁠ and ⁠Instagram⁠) serves as host and producer of Problematic Fave. Brian Aguilar (@bee.rhi on Instagram) also serves as producer and editor of Problematic Fave.

DIASPORA: thediasporatimes.com; @realdiaspora on Twitter, Instagram

Marginal MediaWorks: @mrgnlmedia on Instagram

Send your "problematic faves" to thisisdiaspora@gmail.com and we'll share them on the pod with our guests!

Greta Gerwig's Barbie starring Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling and a small town of pretty actors has been unleashed into the wild and there is a lot to be discussed -- and what better people to discuss this with than with Black Barbie: A Documentary director Lagueria Davis and producer Aaliyah Williams, a pair that has been living, breathing everything Barbie since this documentary about Black Barbie was born. Davis's aunt, Beulah Mae Mitchell worked on the Mattel assembly line and had a hand in changing the landscape when she asked her her boss Ruth Handler, the creator of Barbie “Why isn’t there a doll that looks like me?” The docu explores her story as well as the broader struggle for Black female representation in a world where worthy rarely means Black.

Davis and Williams, along with host Dino-Ray Ramos have LOTS of thoughts as they unpack this film that has been celebrated profusely, marketed aggressively, broken box office records, and caused some pockets of interesting conversation about the iconic doll.

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Lagueria Davis

@lagueriadavis on Instagram and Twitter

Aaliyah Williams

@theliyah1 on Twitter

@theliyah on Instagram

Black Barbie: A Documentary

Dino-Ray Ramos (@dinoray on ⁠Twitter⁠ and ⁠Instagram⁠) serves as host and producer of Problematic Fave. Brian Aguilar (@bee.rhi on Instagram) also serves as producer and editor of Problematic Fave.

DIASPORA: thediasporatimes.com; @realdiaspora on Twitter, Instagram

Marginal MediaWorks: @mrgnlmedia on Instagram

Send your "problematic faves" to thisisdiaspora@gmail.com and we'll share them on the pod with our guests!