Humanism
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Why must disney hire a gay actor for the first major gay role?
This topic contains 22 replies, has 9 voices, and was last updated by 
Unseen 5 years, 7 months ago.
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There is always a major push and pull among marginalized groups in how they are treated by the rest of society (or the privileged as some progressives call it). The push is the need to be treated just like anyone else. The pull is to have our differences known, respected and perhaps even celebrated. Most people seem to need the first (to be treated like anyone else) while the pull, to have DIFFERENCES celebrated is not as actively adopted or expressed by those of a group. The most common example is that of gay people not wanting to be called pejoratives like “fag” but as a person…and yet at the same time feeling it should be respected by the privileged that gay men CAN use that term, both as a term of empowerment “let’s go dancing fags”!!! or as a pejorative “I hate all these flamey drama queen fags here”! This is but one example.
Jack Whitehall has been casted in the first major gay role in a disney film. He is the next of many straight actors to play pioneering gay roles. He says he is honored to play the character. Some people’s first reaction are “this is great”, others is a more angry “why didn’t they find a gay actor” and my reaction is “why has it taken disney films this bloody long to include a gay role while the entire rest of Hollywood started doing that decades ago”? While others ask “is he going to play yet another stereotypical campey effeminate bitchy gay character? (a good question).
In any case, there seems to be a bit of an argument amongst entertainment sites and forums and LGTB+ forums about why the actor isn’t a gay one. Arguments for it range from “openly gay actors are underrepresented in hollywood” (which is true to an extent but no reason to not accept a perfectly good actor who isn’t) and that “a gay actor can best portray a gay character” (which I think is an enormous load of bullshit). When people read a list of major actors who played gay roles…it’s really shocking how long it is, especially when so many play macho roles in typically action and thriller films:
Antonio Banderas, James Woods, Robert Downey Jr., Forrest Whitacker, Steve Buschimi, James Gandolfini, Patrick Stewart, Val Kilmer, Heath Leger, Matt Daymond, Jake Gyllenal, Michael Douglas, Greg Kinnear, Robin Williams, P. Seymour Hoffman, George Carlin, Sean Penn, James Franco, Jim Carrey, Tom Hanks, Collin Firth, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Ewan McGregor, Daniel Radcliffe, , Mike Myers, Wesley Snipes, Hugh Grant, Richard Gere etc.
A very relevant questions is…to what extent did these actors playing major gay roles in major hollywood films, normalise LGTB+ both on the screen and in real life?
And even then, I’m not sure how important which actor plays which role is. It is after all called “acting”. A great actor can play any role if they are up to it. And all of the actors above did a phenomenal role playing characters from utterly soacking in flamey camp to the more masculine gay characters who conspicuously wanted to live their lies without discrimination.
When I think about this problem through the principles of humanism, I find it very difficult to fault Disney for contracting a straight actor to play the first major LGTB+ character. They are, in this very long awaited and long time coming film, contributing to the normalization of LGTB+ in Western art and society and in the same sense treating the people who work in that process as no different from others, that is, not considering who is gay or straight when casting. As far as I’m concerned, they have finally joined the world of equality and inclusivity. To attack them for not picking a specific actor of a specific sexual orientation is, in theory…a good thing…no?
But a vocal minority of LGTB+ are outraged by the sexuality of the actor casted and may succeed in having the actor changed, and in the process perhaps contribute gay actors to being type casted and have fewer straight actors helping to normalize LGTB+ (which has a long way to go). However there seem to be few asking a much more important question: Why did it take Disney so long…meanwhile excluding 5% of the male population from its films and roles for the last several decades?
A lot of people will view this as just a variation on “whitewashing.”
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This reply was modified 6 years, 1 month ago by Unseen.
“However there seem to be few asking a much more important question: Why did it take Disney so long…meanwhile excluding 5% of the male population from its films and roles for the last several decades?”
From my perspective, that question has already been asked quite often. When Finding Dory, Zootopia, and the live action Beauty and the Beast were released, they all contained hints of queerness. This was a welcoming sign to some, but a significant disappointment to others. Why does Disney have to be so reticent with explicit representation? LGBT people are part of the ordinary fabric of society, yet we exist only in fleeting moments and implication in the Disney universe.
The question has been raised many times on why it was taking so long. I’d wager many have just set their expectations much lower for Disney over the years. It’s a company which isn’t particularly antagonistic toward minorities, yet clearly wants to pander to where they believe the majority are most willing to spend their cash. Business first.
Right now I wonder if many are just frustrated with the way Disney chose to join the party after taking so long. It doesn’t bury the frustrations with how long it took; it’s a byproduct of them.
Having more actors from particular minorities helps others in productions get used to having people from those groups on productions, and that will typically result in the environment being more welcoming for everyone. As for celebrating “firsts”, the very fact that something is a “first” is indicative that there is a problem in a particular field, so there’s nothing wrong in celebrating a long-overdue start of change.
With respect to the situation of having openly-gay actors play gay characters, it should be remembered that in addition to channeling their own experience into acting roles, actors also influence the script or portrayal. For far too long LGBT characters have been portrayed either very stereotypically, or as pathetic victims, or evil people. This has an effect back in the real world, where some people’s only knowing exposure to LGBT people is through the film and television. Representation matters, and typically those who don’t acknowledge that are from groups which already have an abundance of it, and are therefore blind to the problem. Having actors from underrepresented groups helps counterbalance that. It’s not like there is a shortage of roles for cis, straight men.
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This reply was modified 5 years, 7 months ago by
Kara Connor.
It’s called “acting” for a reason. Hell, wasn’t Yul Brynner (Hungarian) great as the King of Siam in The King And I? And Espera Oscar de Corti (Italian-American) played A Native American in many a Hollywood “B” Western under the stage name Iron Eyes Cody. What’s wrong with that?
Jon Lovitz says it best:
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This reply was modified 5 years, 7 months ago by Unseen.
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This reply was modified 6 years, 1 month ago by
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