Buzzworthy: Viola Davis in The Help

Viola Davis has heard all the buzz – the good and the bad – about her new film, The Help. Possible Oscar? Yep. Yet another Mighty Whitey film? She's heard that one, too. Still, the Academy Award-nominated actress shrugs – proverbially – and says there was no way she could ignore the richly drawn characters in Kathryn Stockett's best-selling novel. The story centers around three main characters – Davis is Aibileen Clark, a middle-aged maid who has worked tirelessly (even when her son died tragically); the sassy-talking maid Minny Jackson (Octavia Spencer) and recent college graduate Skeeter Phelan (Emma Stone), the young White woman who wants to write a book from the viewpoint of the Black maids in Jackson, Mississippi. The story is set in thick of the Civil Rights Movement – and Black people hearing the n-word doesn't come from a hip-hop song; it comes from the White oppressors who hope things stay the way they are.

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