updated: 01/11/2006
Hollywood has a fairly abysmal record on the portrayal of trans-ethnic roles: both the characters and the makeups have more than tended to the stereotypical. I don’t see anything wrong in and of itself in an actress playing a character whose ethnic origin is other than her own (anymore than I objected to Rock Hudson playing all those straight roles): but the whole issue is entangled (possibly inseparably) with the issues of how non-whites have been portrayed in films and, for decades, the practical exclusion of non-white actors and actresses from the Hollywood system.
Not all the actresses here are ‘white’ but they generally portraying an ethnicity which has a darker skin tone than their own, as in Partition where Kristin Kreuk, who is part Indonesian Chinese, plays an Indian girl: some of her previous roles have been explicitly ‘white’ (eg Snow White). Similarly, Jessica Alba, of Mexican-French-Danish descent, qualifies by my definition when she plays a Dayak girl in The Sleeping Dictionary. In the event so would Thandie Newton or Halle Berry if either were to be cast as a Zulu or Masai woman.
For more information on and background to of the ignoble history of yellowface and blackface in the movies see the Robert Ito’s A Certain Slant from Bright Lights Film Journal and Bambizzoozled.
Anyway for better or worse here you can find examples of actresses in blackface and yellowface: sometimes playing a black character (eg Black Narcissus) sometimes playing a blacked-up white character (eg Lady Caroline Lamb). If I find any I’ll also include black or Asian actresses playing white roles: if anyone knows of any examples of whiteface, please email me.