IT’S LIT

OLLYWOOD HAS A WAY OF TELLING US WHO IS BEAUTIFUL and who isn’t—both explicitly and implicitly. Just take a look at how Black and brown bodies are captured on screen compared to their white counterparts. Due to the industry’s seeming inability to properly light people with darker pigmentations, we often appear couched in myriad shadows or completely washed out, like Michael K. Williams as (the appropriately named) Chalky White on . It’s a phenomenon, unfortunately, that viewers expected, or at minimum ignored, until filmmakers of color like Ava DuVernay started speaking up about the necessity of properly lighting more melanated casts. Now, projects like the filmmaker’s own, the Oscar-winning , and Issa Rae’s HBO comedy are revered for the ways they’ve revolutionized how people of color are shown on screen.