An upcoming Netflix series has sparked backlash before its release.
According to BBC, Egyptian lawyer Mahmoud al-Semary filed a lawsuit on Sunday (April 16) against Netflix shortly after the official trailer was dropped for Queen Cleopatra, an upcoming docuseries that depicts Cleopatra as a Black woman.
The lawsuit accuses the company of trying to “erase the Egyptian identity,” per BBC. Through the legal complaint, al-Semary called for Netflix to be shut down in Egypt and for the show's creators to be penalized.
“Most of what Netflix platform displays do not conform to Islamic and societal values and principles, especially Egyptian ones,” Al-Semary said in his complaint, according to reports.
Queen Cleopatra star Adele James shut down critics on Twitter last week, saying if people “don’t like the casting don’t watch the show.”
Jada Pinkett Smith, an executive producer on the show, explained the move to cast Cleopatra as Black on Netflix’s promotional website Tudum.
“We don’t often get to see or hear stories about Black queens, and that was really important for me, as well as for my daughter, and just for my community to be able to know those stories because there are tons of them!” Pinkett Smith said.
Some historians argue that the iconic monarch was likely not Black, but others cite that Cleopatra's race was “unlikely to be documented.”
“Cleopatra ruled in Egypt long before the Arab settlement in North Africa. If the maternal side of her family were indigenous women, they would’ve been African, and this should be reflected in contemporary representations of Cleopatra," Sally Ann Ashton, an Egyptology expert who Netflix interviewed in the series.
However, al-Semary's lawsuit alleges that Netflix is attempting to “promote the Afrocentric thinking ... which includes slogans and writings aimed at distorting and erasing the Egyptian identity."
Queen Cleopatra is expected to hit Netflix on May 10.
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