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The film departs from the facts of Allen's life. The central character, "Cecil Gaines", is only loosely based on the real Allen.
Loosely based on the real life of Eugene Allen, who worked in the White House for decades, the film stars Forest Whitaker as Cecil Gaines, an African American who is a witness of notable political and social events of the 20th century during his 34-year tenure serving as a White House butler.
Aug 8, 2013 · In 1952, the real Cecil Gaines, Eugene Allen, was working as a waiter at a Washington D.C. country club. After being informed by a co-worker of job openings at the White House, he applied. Allen met with Alonzo Fields, a maitre d', who instantly liked him.
Aug 16, 2013 · Daniels’ film replaces the real Eugene Allen with the fictional Cecil Gaines, using the unique perspective of a White House butler as a jumping-off point to explore questions of race in the ...
Aug 4, 2018 · A scene from The Butler depicting Cecil Gaines, the fictionalized version of Eugene Allen, and his response to the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Aug 15, 2013 · But the names have been changed: Allen and his wife, Helene, are called Cecil and Gloria Gaines. (They’re played by Forest Whitaker and Oprah Winfrey.) At least one key character, Cecil’s son...
Cecil Gaines was a sharecropper's son who grew up in the 1920s as a domestic servant for the white family who casually destroyed his. Eventually striking out on his own, Cecil becomes a hotel valet of such efficiency and discreteness in the 1950s that he becomes a butler in the White House itself.
In The Butler, Whitaker’s Cecil Gaines is a slightly fictionalized version of Allen, one whose story—though very close to Allen’s own—plays better as the stylistic, sweeping melodrama the...
Aug 21, 2013 · The new film, which stars Forest Whitaker as the fictional butler Cecil Gaines, is not a biopic, rather a portrait of race relations through the eyes of one man. It is also not the first...
Aug 5, 2022 · Daniels’ 2013 feature, ‘The Butler,’ revolves around Cecil Gaines (Forest Whitaker), who became a member of the White House Staff and served under several US presidents during his 34-year tenure.
