Viola Davis feels like she betrayed herself by being on The Help

Viola Davis says a part of her feels like she was betrayed by starring in The Help.

The Academy Award winner explained her mixed feelings about the 2011 film in a profile for the August issue of Vanity Fair, and told the magazine that “ no one is not entertained ” with the film, It was created “ for a white audience. ‘

Viola, 54, said she regrets being in the movie because ‘she wasn’t ready to [tell the whole truth]’on racism.

Sorry, I have a few: Viola Davis says she sometimes feels that she has been “betrayed” by appearing on The Help in 2011 in a new profile for Vanity Fair. Upstairs she is seen wearing a stunning blue Max Mara dress and Pomellato earrings for the cover

The film follows the story of two blacks working as servants for a white family in Mississippi amidst the Civil Rights Movement and has been criticized for having an over-simplified view of race relations.

Others have called The Help a “white savior” story because of the ways it focuses on the feelings of its white characters rather than the struggles of black protagonists.

But Viola said The Help was the right part for her at that point in her career.

“I was that official actor, trying to get in,” he explained.

And Davis enjoyed working with the powerful, female-centric cast of Octavia Spencer, Emma Stone, Bryce Dallas Howard, and Jessica Chastain led by writer and director Tate Taylor.

Wrong Approach: The Academy Award Winner Explained Her Mixed Feelings While “There Is No One Who Is Not Entertaining” With The Film, It Was Created “Serving A White Audience”

Too Simple: The film follows the story of two blacks working as servants for a white family in Mississippi amidst the Civil Rights Movement and has been criticized for having an over-simplified view of race relations

More humane: “Not many narratives are invested in our humanity,” Davis said. “They are invested in the idea of ​​what it means to be black, but … it is serving the white audience”

“I can’t tell you the love I have for these women and the love they have for me,” she says. “But with any movie, are people ready for the truth?”

Still, he was put off by the over-simplified way the film dealt with racism and the inner lives of black characters.

“Not many narratives are invested in our humanity,” said Davis. They’re interested in the idea of ​​what it means to be black, but … it’s catering to the white audience.

She continued, “ The white audience at most can sit back and take an academic lesson on who we are. Then they leave the cinema and talk about what it meant. They are not touched by who we were.

‘There is no one to be helped by Help. But there is a part of me that feels like I betrayed myself and my people, because I was in a movie that I wasn’t ready to [tell the whole truth]Viola admitted.

In this way, Viola said that La Ayuda was “created in the filter and the cesspool of systemic racism” that permeates society.

Complicated feelings: ‘There is a part of me that feels like I betrayed myself and my people, because I was in a movie that I wasn’t ready to [tell the whole truth]Viola admitted. They have seen her with her co-star Octavia Spencer at the 2011 SAG Awards

Dark: Viola said The Help’s problems stem from being ‘created in the filter and the cesspool of systemic racism’ that permeates society

This is not the first time that Viola has been outspoken about her work on The Help.

In 2018, she told The New York Times, “ At the end of the day, I felt like the voices of the maids were not heard. I know Aibileen. I know minny [Jackson]. They are my grandmother. They are my mom.

“And I know that if you make a movie on which the whole premise is based, I want to know how it feels to work for whites and raise children in 1963, I want to know how you really feel about it.” I never heard that in the course of the movie.

Since then, the How To Get Away With Murder actress said she has viewed her entire career as a release exercise.

“I feel like my whole life has been a protest,” revealed Viola, the first black woman to win an Emmy for the lead actress in a drama.

‘My production company is my protest. Not wearing a wig at the Oscars in 2012 was my protest. It’s part of my voice, just like introducing myself and saying, “Hi, my name is Viola Davis.”

Living out loud: “I feel like my whole life has been a protest,” Viola said. ‘My production company is my protest. Not wearing a wig at the Oscars in 2012 was my protest. It’s a part of my voice, like introducing myself and saying, “Hi, my name is Viola Davis.”