One of my favorite musicals of all time is Les Miserables. One day during my reading of I am Not Sidney Poitier I was watching the film adaptation of the musical and noticed a similar theme between the two. The novel ends by Not Sidney allowing people to assume he is Sidney Poitier and accepting an award on his behalf. He was talking to people that assumed he was Sidney as if he was actually Sidney Poitier and never corrected them. After a life of constantly explaining that he is not Sidney Poitier, he finally gives up and just lets people assume what they want to assume. In Les Miserables a similar situation takes place. Throughout these two situations, a character changes the way they identify themselves in order to better a situation. Not Sidney begins identifying as Sidney Poitier and Eponine, from Les Miserables begins identifying as a boy in the June Rebellion war.
Throughout Les Miserables, a storyline develops a love story of a low-class girl named Eponine, and an upper-class boy named Marius. Eponine had loved Marius since her childhood. Her family was of a higher class but then fell to a lower class because her parents were thieves, and their old tricks were no longer working. Marius comes from a family of wealth but began disassociating with them because he was participating in a rebellion of the lower class. Eponine showed several hints throughout her life to show Marius that she was in love with him. Marius seemed to never understand her feelings towards him and ignored her advances. A new girl, Cosette, comes to town and Marius falls in love with her immediately. Eponine didn’t want this to happen, so she decided to dress up as a boy and take part in a battle that Marius was also fighting in. She gave up her identity as Eponine to force Marius to notice her. In the end, Eponine takes a bullet for Marius as her last attempt to show Marius how she feels. He realizes that this boy he had been fighting alongside was Eponine. He finally realizes how she has felt towards him, but it was too late. Eponine completely stripped herself of her identity because she was tired of the life she had to live for many years. In order to finally get attention from others, she assumes the identity of a different person. The only way to finally achieve the life she wanted, she has to give up the life she had lived for years. This is very comparable to Not Sidney Poitier.
Throughout the novel I Am Not Sidney Poitier, the main character Not Sidney Poitier goes through life constantly having to explain to people that his name is Not Sidney Poitier, and when he gets older, that he is not the actor Sidney Poitier. He meets many people throughout his life, and the problem constantly presents itself. At the end of the novel, Not Sidney gets off a plane at LAX and is greeted by a driver waiting for Sidney Poitier. The driver assumes that Not Sidney is Sidney Poitier and Not Sidney is tired of explaining that he is not him so he joins the driver and is taken to an award ceremony. He is aware that he is still Not Sidney but doesn’t say anything to anyone regarding this fact. He accepts the award on Sidney Poitier’s behalf and allows everyone to assume that he is Sidney Poitier. On the last page of the novel, Not Sidney states that the people in the audience of the ceremony do not know him, but they may know him better than he knows himself (234). He is confused by his identity because it is constantly questioned throughout his life. A label is just a label and it doesn’t matter because the only aspect of a person that matters is what’s on the inside. Names mean nothing because it doesn’t tell anything about the person, it forces people to make assumptions.
Les Miserables and I am Not Sidney Poitier reflect each other greatly. Although both characters parted from their original identity, it didn’t change the outcome of their situations. Eponine did not get Marius to fall in love with her because no matter what identity she chooses to assume on the outside, she will remain to be the same person on the inside. In Not Sidney’s case, people will assume who they think he is on the outside, while only Not Sidney will know who he actually is. Outside identity does not reflect who people identify as on the inside. Changing a label will not change the person.