Actors playing characters with which they do not share characteristics

[AmazonQueen]

As you said, no one would go around saying "I am white" or "I am black". It is inferred that he had no difference of race to the other competitors in the slums of London, when he mentioned his and his family's history as Bean asked him how he liked his new position.
Anyway, let's just agree (I don't mean you ) that if my summation that he was playing a white person is correct, then it is weird. I never claimed it would be weird if he was playing a black person in the Victorian era. British tv has quotas for minority actors, so such things (the weird part) can happen.

What you seem to be saying is that if a character isn't clearly identified as black you assume they are white.

 

[Kyriakos]

What you seem to be saying is that if a character isn't clearly identified as black you assume they are white.

No(w), I am not saying that, but I think you will insist on seeing it that way.

 

[Ferocitus]

Marlon Brando, as a cunning Okinawan in

 

[Kyriakos]

Rumor has it that in Aeschylus' production of "The Persians", no persian actor was used.
(also, women were played by men - but if you had watched Father Ted you'd know that is just the Greek way)

 

[Gorbles]

The primary harm would be not getting the best actor for a role. If we choose actors that share protected characteristics we will be rejecting others, that may be more relevant to the role. Back to my gay or cocaine addict for Sherlock Holmes example.

How do you know you're not getting the best actor for the role, though?

Like I said, it's 2020. There are plenty of publicly-out LGBTQ actors and actresses. And that's not counting breakout stars.

 

[Bamspeedy]

If straight actors shouldn't play gay roles, then gay actors shouldnt play straight roles, right?

 

[Samson]

How do you know you're not getting the best actor for the role, though?

Like I said, it's 2020. There are plenty of publicly-out LGBTQ actors and actresses. And that's not counting breakout stars.

It is certainly no given, and there will be instances where it very likely the very best actor for the role is gay, such as when the main subject is the gay culture of the 80's (the main movie talked about in the article). However, if the category you are selecting on is not well aligned with the needs of the role, then restricting your choice to only a small subset of the available workforce is likely to reduce the quality of the selected person.

 

[The_J]

On the topic: That's... what it's about, no? People pretending to be someone else. That's the acting. You can't restrict that. Next only British actors should play British characters... that'll end up being nonsense, AND will decrease the quality of the work.
A straight character might be able to portray a gay character very well.
Also the opposite (e.g. Barney in How I Met Your Mother).

I recall a recent-ish tv series starring Sean Bean, set in Victorian times, where a black actor was rather clearly playing a white person. It was pretty strange

To weigh in on this (not quoting the whole discussion), since I also saw it (although this is pretty much not on topic):
The setting is pre-victorian England, 1827. The character which is discussed is a black constable (well, some sort of police man; there's also a black criminal, but that's not the point).
My expectation would have been that this character would be heavily discriminated against, and would behave as someone, who'd expect insults and violence any moment. There's no indication at all though that this character might in his life ever have been treated differently than anyone else in the surrounding. Which I'd deem to be completely unrealistic.

 

[Kyriakos]

^I recall thinking that he is a good actor, but clearly would have felt awkward (himself) in the role of a white person

 

[Gorbles]

If straight actors shouldn't play gay roles, then gay actors shouldnt play straight roles, right?

See this is exactly what I meant by pretending the profession is some kind of fair and even meritocracy.

It is certainly no given, and there will be instances where it very likely the very best actor for the role is gay, such as when the main subject is the gay culture of the 80's (the main movie talked about in the article). However, if the category you are selecting on is not well aligned with the needs of the role, then restricting your choice to only a small subset of the available workforce is likely to reduce the quality of the selected person.

That's a big if though, right? What you're describing there is just logistics. Surely there's no harm in promoting people who fit the role?

Also I feel like I should note this works both ways. By passing over marginalised people from marginalised roles, you run the chance of missing a better fit.

Next only British actors should play British characters...

Yeah, British people. That historically marginalised and underrepresented demographic

 

[Valka D'Ur]

This is the article that prompted me to write this post: Russell T Davies: Straight actors should not play gay characters
This is a progressive issue that I am not really on the progressive side of, so I thought I would present my ideas to CFC and get them torn down.
As I see it there are 3 arguments for this point of view:

• It is more authentic, and therefore the product will be better. While this is a quantitative claim that should be backed up with numerical analysis, I can accept the idea of actors that have real life experience of the issues they are presenting will be able to do it better than those who have not. However, in most roles the primary issues that are presented are not related to sexual preference. For example if we assume Sherlock Holmes was gay, should that role be restricted to gay actors, even when the stories do not involve his sexuallity? Is there any reason to believe that a gay actor would be better at presenting that role that a straight actor who was a high functioning cocaine addict, or some other feature that has bearing on the role but is not a recognised underrepresented class?
• We do it for other disadvantaged classes, so we should do it in this case "You wouldn't cast someone able-bodied and put them in a wheelchair, you wouldn't black someone up". However, there are many disadvantaged classes we do not extend this to. When have we had a blind daredevil, or a one handed Captain Hook? What about casting non-Tutsi or Hutu in Hotel Rwanda? There that is the racial distinction that matters, not the white/black distinction that is usually applied in the west, so should we not be using that? The most difficult to achieve real visibility, though I would say most important underrepresented group, is surely the poor.
• Not made in this article, but another argument is that if characters with these features are played by those without them, then the actors with them will not be able to get work. My problem with this is 2 fold: The small argument, and where I could be wrong, is that while this would be a good argument for not blacking up, the general impression of the acting profession is that homosexuals are overrepresented, as opposed to black people who are underrepresented. The main argument is why apply this logic to this sector, and not the rest of the economy? While I would very much like a policy of full employment, we in the aggregate vote against it. Why should we apply this logic to the acting profession when we do not to the rest of the economy, rather than the opposite view that you must NOT consider protected characteristics in employment decisions?

By this logic, every gay actor playing a straight character should be fired and replaced immediately. Every actor playing a character of some other religion or no religion (assuming the actor is not part of that community or a believer/atheist playing the opposite) should be fired and replaced immediately. All actors from predominantly English-speaking countries should henceforth be barred from working in other countries where they don't have citizenship. And Doctor Who should be canceled immediately, because there are no actors on this planet with two hearts and the ability to regenerate.

Hollywood is big enough to cast actors as closely as possible to whatever demographic(s) their character has, and should make the effort when it involves race/ethnicity being a significant aspect of that character.

That said, other acting venues may not have a choice. We had to use white actors in Thai roles when the theatre company I worked for way back when did "The King and I" because we didn't have enough local Thai actors, singers, and dancers. The man who played the King is actually from India. Some of the actresses were Korean. Did the audience care? No. Did the reviewer care? No. Did we entertain several thousand people and get standing ovations every night? Yes.

 

[Gorbles]

By this logic, every gay actor playing a straight character should be fired and replaced immediately.

That's not the logic, no. That said, the second half of your post is spot-on.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

That's not the logic, no. That said, the second half of your post is spot-on.

I should have put "logic" in quotes. I really don't think what he's saying is logical or reasonable. It means that there is the potential for an actor to be fired for something he would rather is none of anyone else's business. An example would be a gay actor playing a straight man, but he hasn't come out - because he's either uncomfortable about it, means to at some point in the future but isn't ready, or really doesn't see what that part of him has to do with his ability to act and tell a story. If Davies' notion actually led to rules and regulations where every actor/actress had to declare their sexuality on their resume, it would lead to massive breaches of privacy and people getting fired or losing out on work based on something that really shouldn't have even the slightest impact on their ability to act.

It's like saying a blue-eyed person shouldn't play a brown-eyed character (if that's how the character was originally written). Were that the case, they'd have had to cast a green-eyed actor to play Harry Potter and a grey-eyed actor to play Sirius Black (as those particular details are mentioned throughout the novels). Instead, they hired two blue-eyed actors for those roles, and they were both so good at their jobs that most viewers can't imagine any other actors in the parts.

 

[Gorbles]

I should have put "logic" in quotes. I really don't think what he's saying is logical or reasonable. It means that there is the potential for an actor to be fired for something he would rather is none of anyone else's business. An example would be a gay actor playing a straight man, but he hasn't come out - because he's either uncomfortable about it, means to at some point in the future but isn't ready, or really doesn't see what that part of him has to do with his ability to act and tell a story. If Davies' notion actually led to rules and regulations where every actor/actress had to declare their sexuality on their resume, it would lead to massive breaches of privacy and people getting fired or losing out on work based on something that really shouldn't have even the slightest impact on their ability to act.

It's like saying a blue-eyed person shouldn't play a brown-eyed character (if that's how the character was originally written). Were that the case, they'd have had to cast a green-eyed actor to play Harry Potter and a grey-eyed actor to play Sirius Black (as those particular details are mentioned throughout the novels). Instead, they hired two blue-eyed actors for those roles, and they were both so good at their jobs that most viewers can't imagine any other actors in the parts.

The way I see it, "should not" doesn't mean "we should therefore fire people currently in roles they don't fit the archetype(s) for". It just means that ideally we shouldn't - which is exactly what you're saying with the rest of your first post.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

The way I see it, "should not" doesn't mean "we should therefore fire people currently in roles they don't fit the archetype(s) for". It just means that ideally we shouldn't - which is exactly what you're saying with the rest of your first post.

Don't assume I always disagree with you. I just took the opportunity to clarify a bit what I said before, and to offer an example.

 

[Ferocitus]

Henry Fonda as Pierre Bezukhov in War And Peace.

 

[Gorbles]

Don't assume I always disagree with you. I just took the opportunity to clarify a bit what I said before, and to offer an example.

I really don't at all.

That said, the way I see it, comparing something like someone being LGBTQ to someone's eye colour is a relatively shallow comparison. The point why this topic is even a thing is because of the marginalisation inherent in the industry in question. Not because of their eye colour, or like others tried to claim, because they're British or not.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

If a specific director wants to operate by that rule because that's how they work, then fine. If a writer/showrunner wants to make a point of writing a drama about gay people, where only gay actors are cast for the gay parts, then that's obviously fine too and could even be said to contribute to the authenticity and appeal of that particular work. And if a hack writer wants to deliberately make a controversy-baiting statement to promote his new series then that's also fine

 

[AmazonQueen]

To weigh in on this (not quoting the whole discussion), since I also saw it (although this is pretty much not on topic):
The setting is pre-victorian England, 1827. The character which is discussed is a black constable (well, some sort of police man; there's also a black criminal, but that's not the point).
My expectation would have been that this character would be heavily discriminated against, and would behave as someone, who'd expect insults and violence any moment. There's no indication at all though that this character might in his life ever have been treated differently than anyone else in the surrounding. Which I'd deem to be completely unrealistic.

Now if Kyriakos had mentioned that, he just said "poor Victorian cockney".
I think the first known black policeman is 1920s, but as no records were kept there may have been some.
I suspect such a character would've been heavily discriminated against but they would also have to be very determined and self-disciplined and probably not likely to complain to a higher ranking white officer.

 

[amadeus]

“They call me Mister Thornton Witherspoon III.”

I only view “authenticity” through the lens of good or bad acting; if an actor is good, then they should be able to suspend my disbelief. I know Tom Cruise isn’t really a rookie lawyer and Jack Nicholson isn’t really a warped Marine sergeant. But in order to make a good movie, it just takes a few good men.