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Confusion over Dakota Fanning’s new movie leads to uproar on Twitter

No, she's not playing a 'white Ethiopian Muslim.'

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Collyn Burke

IRL

Posted on Sep 5, 2019   Updated on May 20, 2021, 4:43 am CDT

Dakota Fanning faced backlash online after entertainment blog Deadline Hollywood tweeted out a clip of her new movie Sweetness in the Belly and mistakenly identified the actress’ role as “A White Ethiopian Muslim In Refugee Drama-Romance.”

The film, adapted from Camilla Gibbs’ 2005 novel of the same name, stars Fanning as Lilly Abdal, a young woman abandoned as a child by her English parents in Africa. When war breaks out in Ethiopia, Abdal flees to the U.K. as a refugee and begins work to help reunite other refugees with their families.

Twitter users were outraged over the headline and Fanning’s apparent role.

“Dakota Fanning is a what,” Twitter user @Phil_Lewis_ wrote.

Many criticized the decision to cast a white woman as an Ethiopian Muslim refugee.

“so many talented Muslim actors out there and you cast… Dakota Fanning???????????????????? and to play an ETHIOPIAN?????????????? I BEG YOUR PARDON???????????????” user @muhammedbutt wrote.

“This is so coincidental – just yesterday I was saying, you know who would best represent the contemporary refugee experience in Africa? Dakota Fanning,” user @Libyaliberty joked.

Fanning later posted on her Instagram Story to clarify her character’s role in the movie. “I do not play an Ethiopian woman,” Fanning wrote. “I play a British woman abandoned by her parents at seven years old in Africa and raised Muslim.”

dakota fanning sweetness in the belly
dakotafanning/Instagram

In addition to Fanning’s Instagram story, a handful of Twitter users attempted to clarify her role in the film and accused Deadline Hollywood of a deliberately misleading tweet about Fanning’s role.

“Anyway Deadline Hollywood made a clickbait-y title that deliberately mislead people to the point where Dakota Fanning had to put out a statement,” @blackheartwings wrote.

“The #DakotaFanning uproar is a prime example of people not educating themselves before getting outraged on woke Twitter and looking stupid as hell,” @foxymnj said. 

https://twitter.com/foxymnj/status/1169572172383305728

Sweetness in the Belly is set to premiere this week at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival.

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*First Published: Sep 5, 2019, 1:35 pm CDT

Collyn Burke

Collyn Burke is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin. She previously interned for the Daily Dot's editorial team and Two Girls One Podcast. Her work has appeared in the Daily Texan and the Texas Observer.

Collyn Burke