At least a dozen Native American actors don't find Adam Sandler’s upcoming western parody The Ridiculous Six funny. According to multiple reports, extras in the film, primarily from the Navajo nation, walked off the set of the funnyman’s new movie after finding the jokes to be insulting and degrading. The flick is described as being a spoof on western film The Magnificent Seven.
According to Indian Country Today Media Network, “the examples of disrespect included Native women’s names such as Beaver’s Breath and No Bra, an actress portraying an Apache woman squatting and urinating while smoking a peace pipe, and feathers inappropriately positioned on a teepee.”
An extra named Loren Anthony, who was reportedly promised by Sandler’s production company that the jokes would not be racist, told the site that “things started getting weird on set.”
“One thing that really offended a lot of people was that there was a female character called Beaver’s breath,” he explained. “One character says ‘Hey, Beaver’s Breath.’ And the Native woman says, ‘How did you know my name?’”
Allison Young, a Navajo film student, claims that producers told the extras that if they were going to be “sensitive” that they “should leave.”
A rep for the movie defended the flick to TMZ, telling the site in a statement on Thursday: "The movie has ridiculous in the title for a reason: because it is ridiculous." The rep for the film adds that the movie is intended to be satirical and that the diverse cast “is not only part of — but it on — the joke.”
