The "Angry Black Woman" Character as Wilhelmina Slater

Wilhelmina Slater is played by Vanessa Williams, a black woman, in the show Ugly Betty. Her character is a villain role inspired by the executive producer's love of Cruella and the wicked step mother. The reason I put emphasis on her being a black woman is because all of the stereotypes that the character fits, I am not shocked that a black woman was casted for the role. Wilhelmina is described as narcasstic, rude, self centered, manipulative, conniving, mean, and hostile in the video I analyzed . The cast and people on set all described her with those words and to me its more micro-aggressions behind their descriptions because they're all white and thats how they see Black people not just a character in a comedic show. The only people in the cast that said positive things about Wilhelmina's personality was Vanessa Williams and Gabrielle Union. Vanessa saw her character as thoughtful, intelligent, articulate beyond being a villain character and Gabrielle Union said she was misunderstood and just said what everyone else thought but was too scared to say indicating she was blunt. Is there a coincidence that those are the only two Black people in the video that had something positive to say ? I think not. The reason I say this is because even in real life Vanessa mentioned that people acted as if she was someone to be scared of strictly because of her role but not once have I heard about the actresses that play Cruella and the wicked step mother in theater or something being negatively connected to their characters in real life. Overall I applaud Vanessa Williams for understanding the assignment and absolutely killing her role but this is a prime example of the negative connotations media puts on Black women in film/television.