Anne Boleyn

Could be interesting though but not if you were portraying the historical facts. Would also have Hitler turning in his grave.

25Avalon

No I do not expect all actors and actresses to exactly resemble the person they are portraying in all respects but I do expect them to follow known facts such as AB, Bodeccia, Mary Queen of Scots, etc were white. I did watch some of Victoria but stopped watching when I realised that it was at variance with historical facts regarding her and Lord Melbourne as I had studied this period. I know Martin Luther King was black. So to render the argument reductio absurdo Doodlebug would you expect a black actor to play Hitler?

So it is only skin colour that matters, not eyes, hair or any of the other characteristics that make people look as they do?

I don't know enough about the Victorian era to pick up on anything at variance with my understanding of it, but could it be that there has been recent research that has shed a difference light on your own understanding?

I don't know - the relationship between Victoria and Melbourne may have been misrepresented - often dramatists will combine characters for dramatic effect, for instance - but I do know that historians are very wary of talking about 'historical facts' other than to say that a battle or a coronation etc happened on a particular date.

Hitler played by a black actor? I don't know - it would depend why it was decided to do it, which is what I have said about the Anne Boleyn series. Until I've seen it I won't know what I think.

A surface resemblance to an historical figure is not too much to ask for. Also for educational purposes, the film would be useless as Anne was not black and Elizabeth was not mixed race.
I’m watching Halston on Netflix and part of the enjoyment is the surface resemblance to the real person. Wilfully going against it would lessen the pleasure. I suppose as it’s hundreds of years ago, it’s assumed we don’t care.
The argument about skin colour for Othello has been going on for a long time. Shakespeare called him a Moor, which could mean varying shades of darkness.

Maori-Jewish actor playing Hitler.

www.theguardian.com/film/2019/jul/25/jojo-rabbit-trailer-taika-waititi-plays-a-paunchy-hitler-in-anti-hate-satire

Is this allowed?

(Wish there was a sarcasm emoji)

....and Elizabeth was not mixed race.

She wasn't a man either..... and yet.....

www.imdb.com/title/tt0107756/mediaviewer/rm230657793/?ft0=name&fv0=nm0187998&ft1=image_type&fv1=still_frame

i doubt any people under about 40 would even think this is an issue.

I'm on a roll now. Last one, promise....

There is no portrait of Anne that indicates whether she is short, tall, thin or fat. What we know is that she had (or said she had) a little neck, that she was brunette, she was flat chested and that she was not considered conventionally beautiful. Despite this people are happy to see her played by very good looking actors, regardless of the size of their necks or breasts.

People are prepared to allow casting directors to ignore the things we don't know and use their discretion when casting, and to play fast and loose with some of the things we do know about her appearance, but woe betide them if they get the skin colour wrong. I can't help but think that this is 'interesting'.

Quite agree holysteers. For me there has to be at least a surface resemblance to an historical figure and to historical facts. Sometimes art deviates in its presentation to challenge us but loses credibility for me. I don’t watch The Crown as it is historically inaccurate which I do know having lived through the time. Even PH said it only loosely followed history. To people who were not there it is a distortion of the truth which some take as gospel.

For the same reason I do not watch fiction which has been sexed up so it is a completely wrong portrayal of the times and is most definitely not in the book.

25Avalon

Sarnia I think it has been done to challenge perceptions which is something art does. Historically, however, I agree it is incorrect and for this reason I won’t be watching it as I am a purist. For the same reason I did not watch Victoria as it was historically incorrect, and I would not watch a white man portraying Martin Luther King. When it comes to Othello that is fiction and idk how many black actors were around when Sir Larry played the part but he had to black up. Maybe a black actress could be whitened up in the interests of authenticity?

Sidney Poitier was another brilliant actor, still alive at 94.

Thank you. That's the point I was trying to make.

25Avalon

No I do not expect all actors and actresses to exactly resemble the person they are portraying in all respects but I do expect them to follow known facts such as AB, Bodeccia, Mary Queen of Scots, etc were white. I did watch some of Victoria but stopped watching when I realised that it was at variance with historical facts regarding her and Lord Melbourne as I had studied this period. I know Martin Luther King was black. So to render the argument reductio absurdo Doodlebug would you expect a black actor to play Hitler?

So how about the French Canadian actress who played Anne? Does the fact that she was white mean that was OK although it clearly wasn't historically correct.

It does rather seem that whiteness is the most important characteristic for some posters.

Whilst I can see that there are some things that would scream as historically inaccurate (Anne wearing a watch, for instance), I wonder how much of what we consider to be 'facts' from history are, in fact, just interpretations that have caught on - often because of one director's view of how to present them?

Even 'facts' about the times we live in are not cast in stone. Ask two people to write an account of Brexit, for instance, and there is a good chance that they will present very different 'facts'. It is the same with history, except that with the distant past such as the Tudor era, there were fewer people who could write, and each time there was a change of dynasty (or in Henry's case, a change of wife) documents and portraits were destroyed, in the manner of a teenager blocking his ex from Facebook and deleting her photos from his timeline?.
There is such a lot that we just don't know, so it is left to dramatists and authors to make a story out of what little information they have to go on.

It is safe to say that Anne was not black, but casting has never really been about getting a replica of the historical character. It is far more about getting someone who fits with the dramatist's interpretation of events.

Just as an actor's hair colour, height, weight etc are not important (to most people) it is surely time that skin colour doesn't matter either? Would anyone say 'I am not watching that programme because it the casting is just to appease redheads. If Damian Lewis said he was going to play the role of a dark haired character, there would be hell to pay'? I doubt it, somehow.

I thought the art of the actor was portraying a role in all aspects as realistically as they can? If the role was a real person, or someone described in physical terms, I would expect a competent actor to show as many physical aspects as practical of the character they were playing, as well as the psychological aspects, Eyes are not easy to change unless they use coloured contact lenses, but the eyes are small in comparison with the rest of the body. Hair colour is usually dyed if it is very different from reality, gait can be altered (which actor was it who said they always tried to get the shoes right, then they walked as the character did?)

Skin colour can be altered to some extent with makeup, but in the current climate, being asked to look white would be taken as an insult by a non-white actor, just as using a "blacked-up" white actor to play a non-white role was condemned by them. So surely it makes more sense to use an actor who already looks more the part than one who looks nothing like the real-life person?

^^Just as an actor's hair colour, height, weight etc are not important (to most people) it is surely time that skin colour doesn't matter either? Would anyone say 'I am not watching that programme because it the casting is just to appease redheads. If Damian Lewis said he was going to play the role of a dark haired character, there would be hell to pay'? I doubt it, somehow.

When the short Tom Cruise was chosen to play the very tall Jack Reacher in the films of the popular Lee Child books many, many people were unhappy.

what about a woman actor, fiona shaw, plying hamlet.
i think all roles should be open to all actors.
otherwise black actors are going to have a severely limited list.
why shouldn't they have a chance to play the real meaty parts, from history or fiction.
i say they should.

what about a school nativity play.
will the black children never get a chance at mary or joseph, forever consigned to being the black sheep.

When the short Tom Cruise was chosen to play the very tall Jack Reacher in the films of the popular Lee Child books many, many people were unhappy.
Is the Reacher character’s tallness necessary to the plot? If Cruise played Goliath or someone who had to be huge, the objections would make sense, but I’m not sure I’d be bothered otherwise.

The thing is, though, that ‘whiteness’ was never what Anne was known for - her skin colour was incidental to her story and her fate. That’s why it doesn’t matter.

Welbeck And vice versa, acting ability being the main criteria (criterium? criterion?) for casting - but the custom of white actors playing black roles has come in for criticism.

Actually Jack Reacher's tallness is necessary to the plot because he gets involved in a lot of violent situations where his height is a definite advantage. It's quite a leap to imagine Tom Cruise in the same situations.

That’s different then. I haven’t read the books or seen the film, which is why I asked.

Anne’s skin colour is not relevant to her story though, so the analogy is a strange one.

I think we need to differentiate between fact and fiction. Anne was white and a woman. Perhaps she should be played by a black man? Perhaps 12 years a slave should have been played by a white person but it just wouldn’t be authentic.

Regarding Mary and Joseph parts for black kids I remember my brother being blacked up (this was 60 years ago) to play one of the 3 kings. In those days there were no black kids in our area.

i never heard of that happening. just used whoever was around.
i never got beyond being part of the crowd, with some drapery from my mother's box, shuffling in between the audience.

welbeck

what about a school nativity play.
will the black children never get a chance at mary or joseph, forever consigned to being the black sheep.

For more accuracy, then these black children should actually be in the front of the queue for obtaining the roles of Mary, Joseph, etc. Unless, of course, there are Arab children in the school. Always was fed up with the way the very pretty, blonde haired girl got the part of Mary!!!! Of course, for centuries European artists painted their Jesus pictures with little regard for skin colour accuracy.
Skin colour is pretty unimportant in acting any role.

Perhaps 12 years a slave should have been played by a white person but it just wouldn’t be authentic.
Can you not see the difference here? Solomon Northup was a slave because he was black. Anne was not Queen because she was white.

The suggestion that casting directors could equally well have men playing women in roles where the sexy of the character is integral to the role are either missing the point or suggesting that skin colour is so important that it must be a primary consideration when choosing an actor to play a role in which race was irrelevant. Maybe they should ask themselves why they think like this.

I think you're overthinking it. Anne Boleyn is a historical figure. Her life history was real. She wasn't black.
Play around with stereotypes in fiction if you want but, for me, stuck to factual reality.