The Transgender Community’s Ridiculous Crusade against Acting

For how much longer will actors be permitted to act?

The story so far: Actor Mark Ruffalo — an outspoken progressive — had the audacity to cast a “cisgender male,” Matt Bomer, to play a transgender woman in the forthcoming film Anything. Angry that he did not use his position as an executive producer to indulge their every whim, transgender activists attacked Ruffalo on Twitter and beyond. Cowed, Ruffalo responded to the backlash with a series of apologetic tweets. “To the Trans community. I hear you,” he wrote. “It’s wrenching to see you in this pain. I am glad we are having this conversation. It’s time.”

Not all of Ruffalo’s critics were satisfied by his attempts at reconciliation. Indeed, some of them are demanding that he recast Bomer’s role and give the part to a transgender female actress in order to prove his sincere regret.

Transgender actress Jen Richards even asserted on Twitter that the movie would, by itself, endanger the physical well-being of transgender women:

Richards also expressed the opinion that allowing a cisgender man to play a transgender woman will reinforce the belief that transgender women are merely men dressing in drag:

Bizarrely, a writer at the Huffington Post agreed with Richards’s assessment:

Historically, anytime Hollywood says, “Oh, trans women are just men in drag,” and portrays them as such, there is a marked ― and measurable ― uptick in so-called “trans panic” killings, harassment, beatings, discrimination, and suicide rates. It gives bigots a leg to stand on.

If Richards’s comments were to be taken to their logical conclusion, she would inevitably end up demanding that actors no longer, well, act. The culture she seems to envision is one in which actors are permitted only to take on roles that are in consonance with their real-life identities. Is that where we’re headed?

It is possible that a transgender actor would bring a particular understanding to a transgender role. But it is by no means certain. For a start, it is not necessarily the case that the best actor for a given character will always share the exact characteristics or experiences of that character. Moreover, as a matter of artistic principle, producers and directors must be accorded the right to hire the actors they believe are most suitable without being accused of encouraging real-life violence.

On its face, Richards’s approach is untenable. By her rationale, all military movies should feature those who have served in the military, lest the lack of veteran-employment opportunities contribute to the already-high suicide rates. By her rationale, only actual rape victims should be cast as rape victims, lest the impression be given that those who claim sexual assault are just making it all up. By her rationale, only actual slaves should be cast as slaves; only the poor should be cast as the poor; only the marginalized should be able to play the marginalized.

Aside from the obvious impracticality of implementing and enforcing such a system, it would cost the film industry a great lot of talent. Take, for instance, the 2012 film Act of Valor, which cast actual Navy SEALs in the lead roles. Although that film was reverent toward the heroic men that it depicted, its stilted acting received poor reviews. Could it be, perhaps, that moviemaking requires a different skillset than military service?

If Jen Richards wants the world to better understand transgenderism, she’ll gain more by insisting that transgender roles are played by actors who are good than by insisting that they are played by actors who are transgender. Marlon Brando was not, to my knowledge, an actual Mafia boss, yet he somehow he managed to win the 1972 Oscar for Best Actor for his brilliant performance in The Godfather. Dustin Hoffman is not autistic, yet his performance as an autistic savant in Rain Man earned him an Oscar for Best Actor. Meryl Streep never served as prime minister of the U.K. — nor has she suffered from dementia — but she somehow managed to secure several awards for her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. Humphrey Bogart was never employed as a detective, but his performances in detective roles defined film noir for decades. Anthony Hopkins is not a cannibalistic serial killer, but he garnered acclaim for depicting one in The Silence of the Lambs.

#related#You could fill an entire book with similar examples. Are we really to believe that it was offensive for these actors to give the performances they did? Did they — and countless others like them, both those who acted skillfully and those who didn’t — really marginalize, misrepresent, or otherwise harm entire groups of people to which their characters belonged? Surely not.

There is, of course, a certain value to hiring actors who have experienced what their characters have experienced, as there is a value to having such people consult with actors, contribute to screenplays, or offer advice to producers. But it is a bridge too far to insist that directors must cast actors who, essentially, are the characters they portray. If Hollywood were to abide by this principle, the film industry as we know it would cease to exist.

— Alexandra DeSanctis is a William F. Buckley Fellow in Political Journalism at the National Review Institute.