Whitewashing ‘Wuthering Heights’ Now Hits Differently

Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights has been adapted to the big screen numerous times and, save for Andrea Arnold’s 2011 version, has largely been consistent in one disappointing way: the whitewashing of Heathcliff.

So when the complaints about the colorblind casting in Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights” 1came, they didn’t feel entirely unfamiliar. What’s changed is the terrain. Whether it likes it or not, Hollywood is now one of the country’s most visible political battlegrounds — where casting is treated less like a creative choice than as a statement of values.