Fictional Representations of Romani People - Other Media

Other Media

• The Cirque du Soleil traveling show "Varekai" takes its name from the Romani language and the characters represented on stage are loosely based on the nomadic way of life associated with the Romani people.
• A part of the film The Red Violin is with the romani from Vienna, Prussia to Oxford, Victorian England.
• The Chilean telenovela Romané features the life of the Romani in the north of Chile.
• Romani characters are frequently depicted in werewolf films, including Maleva the fortuneteller (Maria Ouspenskaya) in The Wolf Man and the Romani clan of female werewolves in Cry of the Werewolf.
• The movie, Children of Men (2006) based on the P.D. James novel of the same name, features a gypsy woman called Marichka in the refugee camp. At one point when she is trying to help the mother and baby escape, Marichka and the woman engage in a tug of war with the baby, recalling the stereotype of gypsies stealing babies.
• Ashes to Ashes Series 2 2009 Episode 2 — A British television police drama series set in the 1980s. A police officer tries to clear her name when she is involved in the accidental death of an English Romanichal. She uncovers a pre-meditated plot to murder him. The episode does include some stereotypical elements as the plot unfolds; namely the plot device of an old Romani clairvoyant and friction between the police and the Romani camp. However these stereotypes are turned on their head as the local doctor who was obsessed with the victims wife is found guilty of poisoning and elements of police corruption. A supporting principal character is revealed to be part Romani.
• In 2002 the WB television series Charmed aired the episode "The Eyes Have It" which depicted Romanies as practicing a magical craft similar to those of modern-day witches. Much like the star witches in the series, Romanies possess supernatural powers and pass down family Books of Shadows.
• On the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Romanies in 19th Century Romania place a curse on the vampire Angelus to punish him for the murder of a little Romani girl, by restoring his human soul (and by extension, his conscience) and forcing him to feel guilt for his crimes. Angel was doomed to misery until he could enjoy a moment of pure happiness.
• The Canterville Ghost (1974) Television dramatization - Based on the (1887) short story by Oscar Wilde. An English gypsy group are suspected of kidapping a girl but are innocent and join in the search.
• The videogame Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King features Romani characters Kalderasha, named after the Kalderash, and his daughter Valentina.
• In The Andy Griffith Show, episode 183 in the sixth season is titled "The Gypsies". A family of Romanies (one of whom is played by Jamie Farr) places a curse on the town of Mayberry.
• In the Star Wars New Jedi Order series of books, the Ryn race are inspired by the Roma.
• In the anime Blood +, it is implied that the character Haji is Roma. However, he was bought from his caravan at a young age and does not identify as such thereafter.
• In Train de Vie, a group of fleeing Jews meet up with a large group of Roma.
• Lark Rise to Candleford, Series 2 Episode 1 — A BBC costume drama. The village is haunted by the spirit of a young English Romany girl who drowned in the local lake.
• Meggan of the Marvel comics superhero team Excalibur was born to a band of Romanies in England. She was expelled when they saw that she was a shapeshifter, and believed her to be a demon.
• In the anime Cowboy Bebop, the character Faye Valentine claims to be one of the Romani people, though this is later dispelled through her own personal flashbacks.
• In the Batman series of comics, the character Richard Grayson (a.k.a. Robin and Nightwing) is shown to be of Romani descent.
• While the canonical origin of the supervillain Doctor Doom has varied over the decades, he is usually of the Romani people, and was driven to his nominally villainous actions as a response to the persecution of his family. As dictator of the fictional nation of Latveria, Doom has taken a special interest in the welfare of Gypsies, as that is his heritage, and often that race is first to be taken care of in a manner similar to Saddam Hussein showering his Tikriti tribe with benefits.
• In the HBO series Carnivàle, the characters of Sophie and her mother Apollonia are said to be Roma.
• In the web comic The Science Table Comic, Alex, one of the recurring characters, is a gypsy and is adorned in what is stated by another character as his "Traditional native garbs."
• In Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock, the sentient anthropomorchi Trash Heap refers to herself as a 'gypsy Trash Heap' when she performs her only act of magic.
• Twins Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver respectively, of Marvel Comics are of Romani ancestry through their biological mother Magda and raised in the fictional Mount Wundagore. During Marvels Mystic Arcana the Scarlet Witch was one of the prominently featured mystic characters and depicted her Romani childhood and her encounter with other Marvel mystical characters. The Young Avengers Wiccan, Billy Kaplan, and Speed, Tommy Shepherd, are believed to be, and accepted as truth by the characters, the reincarnated souls of the Scarlet Witch and the Visions twins and can be classified as Romanies through their mother.
• In the videogame Psychonauts, a rival gypsy circus curses the main character's family to die in water.
• In the first season of Car 54, Where Are You, Maureen Stapleton plays a Romani matriarch telling fortunes from a storefront in Toody and Muldoon's precinct. Stereotypical jokes abound. She lifts a guy's wallet, the father is a layabout, the children don't go to school, they pack up and move to another storefront in short order, etc.
• An episode of Dennis the Menace featured a group of Romanies who visited Dennis' town, were accused of theft, and almost inveigled police Officer Murphy into marrying one of their women, to whom he had offered bread at dinner.
• 2001 UK Film Gypsy Woman starring Jack Davenport and Neve McIntosh.
• 2007 episode of House, in which House must treat a 16 year old Romani boy with respiratory distress.
• The Fullmetal Alchemist movie Conqueror of Shamballa features gypsy women in Germany around World War II.
• In the television show Criminal Minds, the fourth season episode "Bloodlines" depicts a family of Romani who kidnap little girls to marry their sons.
• In the anime Kaze to Ki no Uta, Serge Battour is the orphaned son of a viscount and a beautiful Roma woman.
• In the latest instalment of the Assassin's Creed series, Assassin's Creed: Revelations, courtesan NPCs are replaced by Romanies which act as moving hiding spots and can be used to distract guards.
• The Crimson Skies character Nathan Zachary has claimed Romani heritage.
• The character Willa Monday on the TV show The Finder is Romani.
• According to Naoko Takeuchi, the creator of Sailor Moon, Setsuna Meioh (a.k.a. Sailor Pluto) is half-Roma.