Casting Cora -- ep. by Nicole Dixon

A short take on Thuso Mbedu from South Africa who was cast as a 15-year-old enslaved black girl named Cora in the film adaptation of Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad.

Episode written and read by Nicole Dixon

Transcript

The adaptations of African American literature benefit actresses and actors across Black diaspora. 

Look at the backgrounds of black cast members for the Underground Railroad, the 2021 Amazon Prime Series adaptation of the 2016 novel by Colson Whitehead. 

You’re listening to Remarkable Receptions — a podcast about popular and critical responses to African American novels and more. 

The streaming series adaptation of the Underground Railroad includes actor William Jackson Harper, who’s from the U.S., Sheila Atim from Uganda, Aaron Pierre from the U.K., and Thuso Mbedu from South Africa.

Mbedu was cast in the leading role as Cora—a fifteen-year-old enslaved girl from Georgia. However, Mbedu is neither a Georgian nor fifteen. Regardless, as a 31-year-old South African woman, she was cast and even awarded for her portrayal in this role. 

In an interview, Mbedu revealed that upon being cast for the role and learning the history of the actual Underground Railroad, she insisted that the movie producers provide her with a dialect coach. 

Her initial worries about learning a Southern black accent subsided as she surprisingly found it easier than the standard American accent.

Mbedu has also spoken about how much she had to learn and even unlearn for this part. She says she often thought about how an enslaved person would look in different moments, like on the plantation fields versus in the home of a well-to-do white South Carolina family. 

Adaptations of literature, especially African American literature, compel audiences to contemplate what it means for a diverse range of Black people to play the roles of Black American characters.

What difference does it make that a South African woman plays the role of an enslaved Black American girl? What are the implications of intra-racial, cross-cultural casting?

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This episode was written by me, Nicole Dixon. The episode was edited by Elizabeth Cali and Howard Rambsy.

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This podcast, Remarkable Receptions, is part of the Black Literature Network, a joint project from African American literary studies at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and the History of Black Writing at the University of Kansas. The project was made possible by the generous support of the Mellon Foundation.  For more information, visit blacklitnetwork.org.