Last week, our friends over at Boardwalk Times reported that Disney’s Song of the South and Jim Crow would not appear in Disney’s Dumbo on Disney’s streaming service Disney+.
The outlet took unnecessary backlash for their report, so I took to Twitter to share my thoughts on the matter.
Getting a lot of questions about @BoardwalkTimes report on Song of the South and Dumbo on Disney+.
All I will say is… don’t discount it, I’ve heard the same in the past. Now whether Disney goes through with it is another question entirely.
— Skyler Shuler (@SkylerShuler) April 19, 2019
Now, thanks to The Hollywood Reporter, they have confirmed their report.
The fact these won’t appear on Disney+ is consistent with Disney’s previous policy regarding the 1946 film, which has been criticized for its portrayal of African Americans following the end of the Civil War. The film, which won an Oscar for original song “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah” and inspired the Disneyland ride Splash Mountain, has not been released on home video in the United States. CEO Bob Iger spoke about the decision during the company’s 2011 annual meeting, saying that, after a re-watch of the film, he felt parts of the film “wouldn’t necessarily sit right or feel right to a number of people today” and that “it wouldn’t be in the best interest of our shareholders to bring it back, even though there would be some financial gain.”
The company also doesn’t plan to include a scene from the animated film Dumbo featuring a crow named Jim Crow, a reference to a 19th-century blackface character that later became the name of the segregation laws enacted following the Reconstruction era. The scene does not appear in Tim Burton’s live-action remake of the original 1941 animated film.
Disney+ launches on November 12, 2019, at $6.99 per month or $69.99 annually.
Source: Boardwalk Times & THR
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