‘Rings of Power’ Star Sophia Nomvete on Fighting Racist Backlash: “My Place in This Show Is Not Just a Celebration, It Is an Act of Defiance”
Several castmembers from The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power series have been vocal about the racist backlash they received upon joining the Tolkien universe, and now actress Sophia Nomvete, who plays Disa, is opening up in detail about what that experience was like.
At The Hollywood Reporter’s second annual Raising Our Voices luncheon, sponsored by the Golden Globes, GenSpace and East West Bank, on Wednesday, Nomvete took part in a conversation on “The State of Inclusion in Storytelling,” moderated by Gloria Calderón Kellett. Asked by Calderón Kellett about the negative reaction, Nomvete — whose character is the first female dwarf of color in The Lord of the Rings universe — said her casting “was a huge moment, both personally and professionally. And I think I kind of skipped in naively thinking that it’s gonna be great. I’m a dwarf, it’s gonna be such fun.”
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“When the announcement came out and pictures went up about just our faces of who we were playing, I was statistically the most attacked castmember of the entire show,” she continued. “There were N-bombs, I had no place here. ‘You’re too fat, you’re too black. Why are you here?’ I had one that was actually very polite, who said, ‘I’m sure that you’re a wonderful actress and a really lovely person. I just, I don’t think you should be part of this, it’s not right. If you could potentially just send a letter to Amazon with your resignation, I’d be very grateful.'” Nomvete joked, “I thought, ‘No, I’m not going to do that, I can’t.’ I can’t afford to resign for you, so sadly I’m here to stay,” even as her family was threatened.
In deciding to remain on the Amazon series, “I realized that my place in this show is not just a celebration, it is an act of defiance against a reality that is simply not true, which is that we have no place on screens or in fantasy spaces,” she said, adding that one day she got a message that paralyzed her to the extent of being unable to leave her bed. The following day, her husband sent her a photo of their daughter pointing to Nomvete’s face on a billboard in London.
“I realized that for her, and for the future of our industry and the generation, it is a must that I stand in my power and my light and do as much as I can with this character,” the actress said. “And so I marched to the showrunners and I begged them to make this moment matter. I begged them not to make her subservient or just the wife-of or the funny fat friend. I begged them to make her quite a sexual titan.” She noted that her character gets an onscreen kiss, wears the least clothing, and has her own drive and ambition.
“I went through the seven stages of grief by reading some of the comments, and then understood the assignment. I understood the assignment, and that was to help people understand and to embrace them and love them — you would never disregard a child if they were scared. They’re scared. They’re frightened because they haven’t seen us before,” Nomvete continued. “So in that moment and throughout this show, I’ve made it my mission to ease their fear, and to let them understand and to help educate them that it’s OK, that we can tell a story, that we can be here and the show will be better for it, that our industry and our world will be better for it.”
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