Egypt challenges Netflix with local documentary on Queen Cleopatra

An Egyptian satellite TV channel announced that it is producing a documentary film regarding Cleopatra VII in response to Netflix's upcoming docudrama series depicting an 'African' queen.

Al-Wathaeqia (The Documentary) channel, a subsidiary of the United Media Services, said on Sunday that a committee of experts on history, archaeology and anthropology had been formed to ensure the documentary film is "as historically precise as possible."

In a telephone interview with Egyptian satellite Al-Nahar TV channel on the same day, former minister of antiquities and prominent archaeologist Zahi Hawas called for releasing the documentary in English language and broadcasting it on all international channels "so that the whole world can watch it" as a means of confronting the impact of the Netflix series.

Queen Cleopatra was born in Egypt's Mediterranean city of Alexandria in 69 BC and belonged to a Greek-speaking dynasty. She was Macedonian-Greek on her father Ptolemy XII's side. Cleopatra ruled over Ancient Egypt from 51 to 30 BC and was the last ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom.

Shortly after Netflix released the trailer last month, Egyptians were quick to launch a viral campaign and petitions to call off the show.

While some reasonably argued that the ancient queen was light-skinned due to her European background, others expressed their views in racist ways, particularly towards Africans, even though Egyptians themselves are multiracial.

Egyptian lawyer Mahmoud El-Semary filed a complaint before the prosecutor-general, calling for shutting down the California-based Netflix streaming platform in Egypt after it had announced the release of a docudrama series depicting a black-skinned Queen Cleopatra.

Semary accused the streaming platform of "attempting to erase the Egyptian identity".

The show is scheduled to be released on 10 May, starring actress Adele James.

Egyptians have frequently accused the Netflix show of "promoting Afrocentrism" in an attempt "to distort the Egyptian identity."

Egyptian political satirist Bassem Youssef slammed Netflix. "They are stealing my culture," he told English TV host Piers Morgan in a remote live interview during his show Uncensored. 


Last week, Egypt's antiquities ministry weighed into the dispute, publishing a detailed statement that included statements from several experts, arguing: "Cleopatra had white skin and Hellenistic characteristics."

Mostafa Waziri, head of the Supreme Antiquities Council, described the depiction of the famous queen as black as nothing less than "a falsification of Egyptian history," insisting that there was nothing "racist' in this view.

In 2009, a BBC documentary claimed that Cleopatra was part African.        

This was not the first time Cleopatra became a subject of debate. In October 2020, the choice of Israeli actress Gal Gadot to play the role of Cleopatra in a Hollywood film sparked an outcry in Egypt, despite a state of technical peace between Egypt and the Zionist state.