- So, Obioma, thank you so much
for joining us to talk about your new book,
The Problem with My Normal Penis.
It's a cracking title.
Can you start by telling me how the title materialized,
why you picked that?
- Yeah, I think weirdly when the book came to me
that was the first thing that came to me,
was this idea of, with masculinity
and with our ideas about what masculinity is,
if you exist sometimes on the end of that spectrum.
So be that as a black man who is in society hypersexualized
or even as an Asian man,
who, again as a part of that same spectrum
is under sexualized and seen as somehow asexual
and not a sexual threat
that actually this idea of what normal is.
Isn't as neutral as I think we think it is.
And it's really interesting,
'cause I think lots of people see the title
and get a bit scared.
"It's got the word penis in it."
And it's been really interesting actually,
there are some radio shows and TV shows
that are just like, "We love the book,
really enjoyed it.
Can't talk about it though
because it's got the word penis in it."
And I think, actually that's a large issue
that the book tries to discuss
but also in a wider sense, more societally,
we don't want to discuss male sexuality.
We're okay talking about vaginas
and the anatomical nature of that,
and discussing female reproductive rights
or the fact that there are women
who are sexually assaulted and harassed,
but we never discuss who's doing the harassing,
and where that problem and issue originates from.
We have a tendency sometimes to recognize
that there are these people who exist
on the extremes of society,
who are the sexual assailants and harasses.
And they're terrible people
and let's of string up Harvey Weinstein
and how did that happen?
But of course those are the extremes.
And that actually the thing that takes more work
is actually in interrogating the low levels
of misogyny and narratives
that a lot of men and women have internalized.
And how can we begin to unpick that?
- And you talk about the story that are
in some way form the title in the book.
So can you explain a bit how blackness,
your blackness has unwantedly changed your sex life?
- Yeah, I think, and I dunno what words I can say here,
but I have been mid coitus with people
who in the middle of sex have said the N word
and felt very comfortable using that.
And weirdly as well, I think
because I have spent the majority of my life in England.
We don't really use the N word here in the same way.
So hearing it in a British accent
is always a bit jarring anyway.
But when I did hear it
and I realized actually hearing that mid sex
and realizing that that is how somebody was viewing me,
meant that in this thing that is as intimate
as two people can get,
there was actually a rather large gap
between us where we weren't connecting
in the way that I thought we were.
I existed as an idea, as a hypersexualized version
of myself that has a lot of baggage
that attached to it with what it is to be a black man
or an an N word, dick.
And so having that was complicated
because there's this odd sense of,
I don't wanna say betrayal, that's the wrong word,
but up until this point, I thought,
"Oh, this is someone who I can feel quite close with,
safe with, and want to feel intimate with."
And then once that fisher was acknowledged,
I had to just to keep myself safe,
remove myself from that situation.
And so I think, yeah, if we're talking about normal
and what normal is
whether we want to acknowledge it
on a conscious or subconscious level,
we are taught what is acceptable.
- You write in the book
about what you're shown as a hero as a kid.
And a lot of that plays into the masculinity as you grow up.
So explain a little bit what you saw as a hero
when you were growing up.
- I remember watching Rocky
and there's a scene in like the first Rocky
where Adrian, he's he's with her for the first time alone
in her flat or in his flat.
And she's like, "Yeah, I'm gonna bounce."
And he is like, "Yeah, no, don't."
And she's about to leave.
She's got a hand on the door
and he closes it and has got a cornered and kisses her.
And eventually, she gives in
and we go, "Yeah, yeah, that was great.
Yeah, Rocky, he won the day."
He went 12 rounds with Apollo Creed and you think,
"I dunno how much she was consenting to that."
And I think what's tricky
is that if you're growing up with those narratives
of pursuing, pursued, that sex is something
that is given up,
then as a teenager and it's constantly low level.
okay, well, you just wear her down,
grind her down, all of that nonsense.
That if you are having that disconnect
where is the moment where you get to, I don't know,
18 you're at university.
You've got your own accommodation for the first time.
You're drinking for the first time.
And you're with a girl,
like what's to stop young men
who have grown up on these narratives,
repeating the same thing as Rocky,
that they've seen in these films.
And he's been glorified and then thinking,
"Oh, yeah, no, no."
But that for you now you are violent consent.
Like you've done it wrong,
but you said that that guy was okay.
And the story that I saw was that she gave into it
and that it was acceptable.
And so if you are not having this conversation
with teenagers, it's not as if they magically get to 18
and go, "Oh, right, I understand consent."
No, you have to have had it before then.
And in the narratives that we're putting out,
we need to be able to have challenging conversations
where we say, "Actually, no it is all the more rewarding
if there is enthusiastic consent.
And if both of both parties are saying,
"Yeah, I'm really I'm really into this."
And that can only work.
If you are saying to men
that your value isn't just in your sexuality,
that actually you are allowed to be your full-self.
- And so you also write in the book
about how the level of the lack of privilege
that being a black man in Britain brings and realizing that
but also about, I guess, is the being what you can't see.
So the lack of black men in power in Britain
and the stats about how far through education
black men might get.
So how do you think that affects how black boys now
are growing up in Britain
and where they see places for themselves?
- Yeah, race and class very much intersect.
And so if we're talking about how much social mobility
we have and where that journey goes,
if we are committed to that,
if we are committed to an egalitarian society
where everyone should have the same options,
well, then we need to make sure that
not only on a race level,
but as I say, these things aren't just silos.
On a class level,
how are we making sure that a rising tide lifts all boats.
There was an afterschool drama club that I went to,
that Daniel Calia went to
and he's been Oscar nominated twice,
won one for Judas and the Black Messiah.
And I look at that and I go,
"Yeah, but that was only possible
because we went to an afterschool thing
that for four quid you could,
for an hour and a half
like do some drama and improvisation games."
Now, I'm not saying that all of us
are gonna go on to win Oscars,
but then comes from like working class roots.
So you only get that if you've watered it now.
And what's tricky is that
that doesn't play particularly well, like stop and search.
"Yeah, I'm hard on crime."
Or like, " I'm gonna come down on this."
You don't see the results of it for another 10, 15 years,
but then when you do as we are seeing now,
when you've cut down on all those community centers
and we go, "I just don't understand how has this happened?
That there's rising knife crime.
And all these people are just hanging out on the street."
Ma'am, you're being disingenuous.
And like, we will know that you're being disingenuous
but politically it plays very well to say,
"Oh, we're gonna put a bunch of coppers on the streets."
Or, "We're gonna be hard on this.
And we're gonna expel people who do that."
And you think, "It just doesn't work."
And because these things like race and class do intersect,
having the ability to have a well-funded school
and with people who can hold the space of,
because I'm not so stressed,
I can look after you and say,
"Listen, how are we gonna get you into Oxford?
How are we gonna get you into Cambridge?
Or how are we gonna get you into politics?"
That only works if you've got the space to do it.
And if you are so worried
about actually I'm not getting paid enough.
And I just I'm too stressed.
I need to go home.
We, as a society, know the value of things like the arts.
And we know that we know that
because in those private schools
where 7% of the population go to
but we end up with 41% of the bathroom winners from,
that 50% of the admissions to Oxbridge
come from private schools.
Well, those private schools
very much don't cut back on the arts.
They hire old RSC actors
to come and be their heads of drama
as they did at Eaton.
Well, you know that because you know that then you end up
with the Tom Henderson of the world.
So you go, why is it actually that those things
that are important are cut back on?
Who do you want to be telling that story?
Do we want to live in an egalitarian society
where you can end up with a Tom Henderson and Daniel Calia?
And if so, well, what are we doing
to pass that ladder back down
and to keep watering those seeds?
'Cause at the moment, I don't know if we're doing enough.
- And what effect has it had on you in the acting industry,
the narrative around like diversity casting,
how do you see that and how has that impacted you?
- Yeah.
(Obioma chuckles)
It's funny, I was doing a show
about a month ago.
Gosh, this the first time I've actually
spoken about it out loud.
And I overheard these four people who had just left the show
and they were talking about my casting
and called it woke silliness.
Because I was playing a character.
This is in Fresno musical.
I was playing a character who isn't...
I don't look like a blonde Norwegian, fine.
Who was played by Jonathan Groff in the animated film.
But I don't think they were expecting me
to be out of the theater as quickly as I was,
but I overheard them calling me a dockie.
And I just thought,
"Huh, it's really sad."
It's really sad because I don't think
the majority of those six-year-olds and seven-year-olds
who were in there who were watching thought about that
for longer than two seconds.
They saw me with the reindeer and went,
"Oh, that's Crystal.
'Cause you've got the reindeer with him."
That was it.
And in a world where you have a princess
or a queen who can turn a whole country to ice
and you have a talking snowman,
having an Irish Nigerian playing
your Disney love interest was too much for you.
That was woke.
That was woke culture of silliness.
Okay, fine.
I'm sorry for you
because you literally won't suspend your disbelief.
You don't know how to,
and that must be limiting for you.
So yeah.
I mean it exists.
I think we're making progress.
I would like to think that Disney
are wonderful in that sense
and are really trying and are leading the way.
But also I think what's tricky
is that there are still those people who,
again, because we live in a society,
because we're still rubbing shoulders
with people whose opinions won't shift overnight.
I have active friends who go,
"Oh, no, they went for the diversity casting."
That's what my agent said.
And he go, "Oh, okay."
So it's not that the other person
was better than you or good.
It was that they were diverse.
Okay.
And that's complicated
because obviously these are people
who you work alongside colleagues, friends,
but their opinions aren't going to change overnight.
And so how do we give ourselves grace
and how do we give those people a safe space
to grow from but also not tolerate
the hurt that it causes.
And I think that's always a fine line.
It's always a fine balance
because I want you to do the learning.
I want you to change,
and for your ideas to shift.
I dunno if I always will have the capacity
to hold your hand through that.
So it's why it's incumbent on all of us
to have those conversations
and to challenge and call each other out.
Because otherwise you are putting
the very people who are most at risk,
at most feeling the consequences
of whatever discrimination or prejudice
to be the ones to shift people's minds of, "I'm hopeful."
- Well, thank you so much.
The book is a great listen.
I'm sure a great read as well.
I personally listened,
and thanks so much for talking to me.
- [Obioma] Thank you.
(upbeat music)