Matt Damon gets backlash for trying to explain racial diversity to African American producer

Matt Damon is causing a lot of backlash for comments he made on his HBO show Project Greenlight, during which he and Ben Affleck give opportunities to aspiring filmmakers.

image via Dara Kushner/INFphoto.com

The discussion turned to diversity, when Damon interrupted successful African American producer Effie Brown to give his two cents on what diversity in film means.

Brown was arguing that the directing team they should choose to win the competition should be diverse, considering the subject of the film they were competing to direct.

“I would just want to urge people to think about whoever this director is, the way that they are going to treat the character of Harmony with her being a prostitute, the only black person being a hooker who gets hit by her white pimp," Brown explained, People reports.

While Brown is trying to make her point, Damon suggested it isn’t necessary for the directors to be diverse, only the subjects of the film.

"When we're talking about diversity, you do it in the casting of the film, not in the casting of the show,” he said, which took Brown by surprise. She replied, “Wow, OK.”

Although he got attacked on social media for this comment, he tried to explain himself at the end of the show by saying they should pick the filmmaking team solely on “merit” and not on how diverse they are.

“If suddenly you change the rules of this competition at the 11th hour, it just seems like you would undermine what the competition is supposed to be about, which is about giving someone this job based entirely on merit and leaving all other factors out of it," he said. "It's just strictly a filmmaking competition."

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