Cast as an example

LETTER writer Tamara Gregory [Letters, May 20] referred to the “racism and continued narrow-mindedness then and now throughout the entertainment community” that resulted in such indignities as casting white actor Laurence Olivier as a black character, Othello, on stage.

A valid point to be sure.

But she then went on to say that it brought to mind the recent casting of Angelina Jolie as Mariane Pearl, widow of slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.

Gregory must have been surprised to read in Kenneth Turan’s Cannes article [“Her Toughest Role,” May 22] that not only had Jolie and Mariane Pearl been friends long before filming began but that it was Pearl herself -- a light-skinned woman of Afro-Cuban and Dutch descent -- who first championed Jolie for the role.

Not a huge casting stretch by my reckoning but one that apparently played right into Gregory’s preconceptions of how things happen in Hollywood.

DAVID BUTLER

Los Angeles