Hollywood Africans Podcast: How Hollywood Screws Up The Portrayal of Africa And Africans

 There are two attributes of podcasts that can attract listeners. First, the podcast that meets your expectations with the tried and true and no surprises. It's safe, comfortable, and easy on the nervous system. On TV, examples would be NCIS, FBI, Hallmark movies, and reality shows. In podcasting, examples include most true-crime shows, celebrity shows, and rewatch shows.

Then there are those shows that offer something unexpected. Something different. Something that takes your confirmation biases, throws them down and smashes them like a vase on a concrete floor.

One of the best podcasts in that category is Hollywood Africans. 

Hosted by award-winning journalist Barbara Angopa and filmmaker Amaka Ugwunkwo, Hollywood Africans reframes the lives of misunderstood characters in the movies.

As the marketing pitch states so succinctly and eloquently: "Silenced, underestimated, objectified, infantilized and vilified Africans on film get their podcast remake."

The short pitch for the show states: "Barbara and Amaka weave in their personal experience, current affairs and social context to reimagine motives and devise alternative plots."

Essentially, the co-hosts review movies that include African characters and discuss how Hollywood screwed up the portrayal of those characters.

 For example, the show's episode on the Tom Hanks film Captain Phillips is a rewatch of the film. In case you haven't seen it, Captain Phillips is a movie about an American merchant mariner who was taken hostage by Somali pirates. 

Of course, the film ignores the fact that the Somali pirates are humans, and watching the film through a different perspective provided by the co-hosts can turn heroes into villains.

The co-hosts do not simply point out all the cultural, racial, and ethnic stereotypes, but also they even reimagine how the movie could be made, using their personal experiences, current affairs and social contexts.  

Take their two-parter on Coming To America with Eddie Murphy, Arsenio Hall, and John Amos.

This episode begins with Amaka bemoaning the sad fact that more than a few people view Africa as one country. Barbara then discusses how the perception of Africa in the 1980s in the U.K. was low because of the AIDS epidemic, famine in Somalia, and apartheid.

This two-part episode enables copious and incisive discussion on the tenuous connection between Black Africans and African Americans. 

Barbara and Amaka note that when first in England people asked them if they lived in a mud hut or had even seen a TV. The point being that the perception in white society is that African society is backward economically, culturally, and intellectually.

The co-hosts point out that in Coming To America that Akeem, the Zamunda prince and Semmi, his trusted confidant, are treated poorly by African Americans, such as Lisa's boyfriend who asks at a football game if Akeem plays games in Africa such as chasing the monkey.

Despite President Trump characterizing people from Africa as coming from "shithole countries" in 2018, the co-hosts rightly point out that many Africans that come to the U.S. do so with medical, legal and professional degrees. 

To be clear, these episodes are not a scene-by-scene dissection of these films. Instead, and more interestingly, the movie plot is the spark for deeper discussions of racial stereotypes, unconscious bias, and ignorance. 

What I admire about this podcast is that Barbara and Amaka focus on their mental energy on biases that are unconscious by filmmakers. Rightfully so, they point out that this subterranean prejudice is so powerful because it is not part of the conscious decision-making of the filmmakers. 

In the U.S., it's the questioning of a Black NFL player pulling into his driveway and then being confronted by a white Karen, who is positive that he does not live there. When exposed, these people always revert to the "I'm not a racist" denial. (True story.) 

The podcast is solid structurally with appropriate intro music, quality sound design and two co-hosts who jell nicely together as a team, are astute observers and commenters on cultural clichés, and methodically dismantle the inherent biases of white, corporatized filmmakers. The show began in September 2024 and has already struck a chord with many listeners interested in the co-hosts' take on bias in films about Africa or Africans. I highly recommend the two-parter on Tarzan.

I highly recommend Hollywood Africans. From a listener's perspective, you'll hear from two engaging and discerning female African co-hosts. You learn about the power of unconscious bias in popular movies. You'll discover that factual historical errors are often superficial compared to significant racial, ethnic and cultural mistakes in these films.

This podcast proves once again that independent podcasters are making the most creative and culturally relevant podcasts in the industry. While iHeart And Spotify are releasing podcasts with celebrities selling nail polish color, Hollywood Africans is asking painful questions about skin color.