Armageddon Time director James Gray defends choice to cast non-Jewish actors as Jewish characters
"I reserve the right" to cast non-Jewish actors as Jewish people, says Gray
Aux News James Gray
Director James Gray’s new film Armageddon Time is inspired by his childhood in 1980 Queens, with Banks Repeta playing a young version of him and Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong play his parents. One casting decision that has drawn some controversy, though, is Anthony Hopkins playing Gray’s Jewish grandfather—since Hopkins himself is not Jewish. It’s a thing that has come up a lot in the last few years, like with Sarah Silverman accusing Showtime of “Jewface” by casting non-Jewish person Kathryn Hahn to play Joan Rivers, but Gray won’t hear it.
Speaking with The New York Times about the film and about the kinds of stories it tells, Gray said that he takes “huge offense” to the idea that someone like Hopkins shouldn’t be playing a Jewish character. He says that it makes him think that people just want a character who reads as stereotypically Jewish, but he says, “That’s not what my grandfather was like. And I’m Jewish.” He adds, “I reserve the right to cast someone like Anthony Hopkins,” on the grounds that, at some point, “we have to acknowledge that our whole function as artists is to try and step into the consciousness of someone else and find compassion and find something of emotional power in doing that.”
The movie is partially about the James Gray character (he’s called Paul) and his friend Johnny (Jaylin Webb), who is Black, and the different way they’re treated when they get arrested for stealing something from school. Gray says the criticism about who he casts “would be valid” if he were the one trying to tell the story from Johnny point of view, but he’s not and “that would be asinine” if he did. “But it’s my story,” he says, “And you don’t have to say that my story is of value, but that’s a different criticism.” Basically, he’s saying that, since the movie is about his own life and he’s the one making it, then he reserves the right to cast whoever he wants.
129 Comments
So if Anthony Hopkins converted to Judaism it would make it okay? That seems… strange.
I mean, sure, if we’re pretending that this conversation is purely about religious practices and ignoring the cultural aspect altogether.
Is religion not “cultural”?
It is but it is only one part of a culture. In terms of Jewishness, there is the ethnicity of Jewishness, the religion of Judaism, and the Jewish culture. Some non-practicing Jews may want to have nothing to do with Jewish culture, but others still enjoy things like eating traditional Jewish food, listening to klezmer, and reading classic Jewish literature. And people like Salman Rushdie have described themselves similarly as a “cultural Muslim Kashmiri” as he still has fondness for the culture of his youth despite no longer being religiously Muslim.
Ethnic Jews trace their ancestry back through the diaspera to the original Isrealite tribe. Compared to even early christianity which was a mix of Jews, Greeks and Romans. Or early Islam which started with Arab tribes but very quickly spread across North Africa, Asia and the Ottoman Empire.
Or fucking skin complexion
That’s confusing the ethnicity of Jewishness with the religion of Judaism. Yes, non ethnically Jewish people can convert to Judaism, and plenty of ethnically Jewish people don’t follow the religion of Judaism, but that’s not the point. You wouldn’t accept that if Hopkins converted to Islam he could play an Arab?
Most Arab-Americans actually aren’t Muslim. And I think most Muslim-Americans aren’t Arab either.
Yes, it’s very much like people of Jewish ethnicity in that way, which is the point. Most ethnically Jewish people in America aren’t practicing. Many are atheists, some are even members of other religions.
Many are atheists sensible.
He wouldn’t have to. There are plenty of Arab Christians.
As well as ethnically Jewish Christians.
I think we solve this problem by having all Jewish roles played by this dude:#notItalian
It’s actually an interesting point that in TV and movies Jewish people are almost always presented as Ashkenazi (Eastern European), and Sephardi (Spanish/Portuguese) Jews, like Hank Azari. who differ culturally (and somewhat ethnically) from them are rarely acknowledged. Yes, I know the joke is that Azari is probably most famous for playing Apu on the Simpsons before that was viewed as inappropriate.
Hey, I like to think he’s also famous for being told where he is in relation to Ashley Judd’s ass:One of my friends in the next town over is a Sephardi. She found out recently, and wanted to get more into Jewish culture and history, and, yeah, the reaction from the Ashkenazi Jewish community (ie, the biggest Jewish community) has been:“Oh, you’re Jewish? That’s great! Welcome!”“Yes, I found out my mother’s Sephardi-”“Oh. Um. Sephardi. Yeeeeeah. That’s…nice.”I joke that I now know of two Sephardis: her and Hank.She jokes that yeah, so does she.There’s also Ethiopian Jews and, brother, lemme tell you, they don’t look anything like Mel Brooks or Barbara Streisand. I mean, when was the last time you saw Hank Azaria get cast in a Jewish role – or, perhap more to the point, how many people do you think know that Hank is Jewish? Apparently he got called “Frank” a lot because with that name – and look at him! – he’s gotta be Italian, right? One of the traps this whole “we must have 100% authenticity in this portrayal of this group” is…well, what is the “authentic” portray of this group? Who’s to decide, and who’s to judge? And often people fall into finding a single most “authentic” take on it, and then defending it vigorously and shaming anything that may fall outside of it as erasure – which means the whole thing winds up less inclusive.Hank’s Jewish, but Hollywood would never cast him as such.
Or you can be the male child of a non-practicing Jewish mother who was adopted. So despite me not being raised in a Jewish household, not believing in God ever and not containing a single bit of DNA in common with the biological children of Abraham I am technically Jewish according to the Law. If my mother was my father I wouldn’t be Jewish at all. And my sisters’ children are Jewish but mine are not even though out of my siblings I’m the only one with an interest in the culture. Religious law seems to have just as weird outcomes as the secular kind.
I might.
That asteroid doesn’t care if you are Jewish or not.
Nor does shingles.
It really comes down to whether Jews are a “race,” a question that we’ve had since we developed the concept of race and will never settle.
He got circumcised.
As long as he is not converting to Judaism for the jokes
I’m a non-practicing Jew and this does not bother me at all. It’s not like Jews are poorly represented in Hollywood. As Mel Brooks said, “if it wasn’t for Jews…there wouldn’t be a theater.”Yes, I edited out the more offensive parts of that quote because, as Mel Brooks also said, you couldn’t make “Blazing Saddles” today.
I’m wondering how far we take this.“You got Stellan Skarsgard to play a Stockholmer! You can’t don that!”“Uh, he’s from Sweden. He’s Swedish.”“Yes, but he’s from Gothenburg, not Stockholm! You cannot be a party to Stockholm erasure!”
Remember that Swedish Bikini Team? Were they all Swedes?
What if you kidnap and then slowly develop a rapport with him?
I misread this as Mel Gibson at first. Quoting him in the subject would have also required you to edit out the more offensive parts.
I think the problem people point out is that yes, there are Jewish actors and actresses in Hollywood, but it seems to be a consistent occurrence that when the role calls for an actual Jewish person they don’t cast a Jewish person.
Right, that was Silverman’s point. She wasn’t saying that gentile actors can’t play jews, she was questioning how those parts are cast. She felt that when parts, particularly women’s, are centered on a character’s jewish ethnicity, the powers that be often seem to go out of their way to cast actors that read as very gentile in real life in an effort to make non-jewish audiences more comfortable. It points to an industry that is still uncomfortable with how it portrays jewish characters.
So, the Jewish actors are getting cast in non-Jewish roles?
They never really mention it but Ant-Man and Black Widow are canonically Jewish.
I think it’s important to remember this role is for someone to play the director’s grandfather.When John Carpenter was cast about for his Elvis movie, and eventually cast Kurt Russel, somebody commented that Kurt didn’t look anything like Elvis. Carpenter was supposed to have said, “I can either get a guy that looks like Elvis or I can get a guy that can ACT.”
As Mel Brooks said “Tragedy is when I cut my finger…”
…I don’t get it. What’s the problem? Where’s the story? It’s not like James Gray of all people is the first Jewish filmmaker to cast non-Jewish actors as Jewish characters in his movies. See Shiva Baby or This Is Where I Leave You. Noah Baumbach does this all the time. Hell, queer filmmakers cast non-queer actors to play queer characters. If this is a problematic phenomenon, I’m open to that discussion, but it doesn’t make a ton of sense to start with James Gray.
The story is Kotaku like even smaller boxxes and divides, but hey, we’re all the same!! My mom can only be acted by my mom!
There is no problem; this is clickbait.
We didn’t land on Jewish Rock, Jewish Rock landed on us!
Replace the headline with “James Gray defends decision to cast non-gay actors in gay roles” and see how the comments change.Either representation matters, or it doesn’t.
Except James Gray isn’t gay. He is Jewish, however, and is telling a story largely based on his upbringing as a Jewish American.
Isn’t it the usual issues about representation and employing minorities?
Just because you have the right not to do that, or it doesn’t bother you, or whatever other feelings and reasons you have don’t make those issues go away.If you choose not to use actors of a particular culture to tell a story of that particular culture, then obviously there are actors of that particular culture that are missing out on work and representing that culture publicly. This is undeniable even if you don’t care.
Theyare definitely not underrepresented in Hollywood.
Except jews are not a minority in Hollywood, and they play “white” roles all the time and nobody cares.
I repeat: If you choose not to use actors of a particular culture to tell a story of that particular culture, then
obviously there are actors of that particular culture that are missing
out on work and representing that culture publicly. This is undeniable
even if you don’t care.
Well then, that’s their problem, isn’t it?
That we choose to either help them with or not.
In this case, seems not.
But isn’t this kind of a straw man? This isn’t Exodus; James Gray is telling his own story, not telling the story of “that culture” at large.
They’re Jewish characters so it’d be hard to argue that they’re not part of Jewish culture. If you make a point of identifying a culture in even a personal story then you’re still representing part of that culture.
Which other actors was Gray considering for the role of his own grandfather that have now lost out on desperately-needed work (seemingly, in your estimation or within the context of the reductive argument you’re making, an argument that should require you to re-read or read the above article) to Anthony Hopkins? Who are these starving ethnically Jewish actors who Hopkins and Gray have robbed of this role? Name them so we can start a GoFundMe this instant!
Is it of that particular culture, or is it from an author that “happens to be” of that culture? Does that mean he cannot tell his story with anyone but a person of a particular background, limiting his minority opportunity?How non-Jewish does a role have to be for you to be satisfied that it can be played by a non-Jew? Or further, should Jews play non-Jewish roles at all? How Jewish is Jewish? Are we going by the rules of Israeli citizenship, by the rules in the Torah, by claim of faith, or by simple self-identification? Do they have to “look” Jewish, too, or are Pauls Rudd and Newman shit out of luck (as Newman was in fact when looking for Jewish roles, save for when Preminger cast him in Exodus)?Should only Jews play, say, Shylock, a problematic as hell role that requires significant readjustment in the modern era, one that many Jews may feel more uncomfortable playing than Gentiles regardless of that adjustment?What if this particular story has far more to do with whiteness vs blackness in America instead of Jewishness, and by demanding he only cast Jews, you’re robbing the film of some impact by having someone with less caucasity than Sir Hopkins, or inserting Jew vs Black narratives that he may be trying to avoid (likely not, but still)? What if by demanding he cast only Jews, it means non-Jews of other ethnicities with less representation in Hollywood don’t get opportunities (like, say, Tony Shaloub, who is Lebanese American, and while he’s by no means unsuccessful, he has few opportunities to play parts specific to his ethnicity, and many opportunities to play Jews: should he be less successful because of that?). What if by demanding he cast only Jews, you are telling a Jewish man that his Jewishness and the Jewishness of the people he grew up with supercedes any other quality they might have as people?You can have your opinions, and to be clear, I’m not even particularly disputing most of the ones presented. But I’m not devil’s advocating, either. These are important questions that reasonable people could have about this subject, not just ones that could “only” be posed by people who disagree with the need for better representation for American minorities in Hollywood. This shit’s complicated, and it should be allowed to be. And that’s far more undeniable, especially if you do care. Reducing film representation to a pure numbers game is reducing human beings to numbers. And if you want to do that to the Jewish population in particular… well, that’s absolutely an uncharitable way to put your contention, and certainly your motivation for bringing up your points. But it is the sort of thing I think about when folks seem so absolutist about representation. Because if all that matters is their Jewishness, then, yeesh, there’s some bad company to that idea.https://religionnews.com/2021/11/03/theater-movies-jewish-jewface-sarah-silverman/
James Gray made the choice to use non-Jewish actors to play Jewish characters, as is his right.
The consequence of this right is fewer Jewish actors were employed.
If this was more of a concern to him, then he could have chosen differently.
I didn’t mention anywhere how I felt about this, but some of you evidently have strong feelings about me stating objective reality.
What is so helpful about “stating objective reality” here? We get it. We can go read the article. You are looking for a problem where there is none.
“Minorities, please stop talking about being minorities. The simple act of discussion makes me uncomfortable.” —Guess Who. Thankfully this is a new and exciting concept.
And nowhere did I mention how you felt about this, nor the emotional strength of my conviction. You seemed to be implying other folks were concerned about it less than you, most of all, a Jew who has often told stories about Jews for a living, one who has indeed very often hired Jewish actors for those roles. And the further implication of that thinking in this particular case is that it is apparently the responsibility of a Jew to hire Jews because his life story happened to be Jewy, and that the ethnicity or faith of those characters/actors (or at least their parents, by some rules) apparently should matter to him more than anything else about them.
You seem to think talking about more than the part of objective reality you want to discuss is immaterial, as is pointing out that your focus is narrow and that there may be consequences to that thinking in the broader context. Which is convenient for a discussion you started, but perhaps not a full picture, and certainly at least dismissive of folks who are trying to broaden the discussion, especially if you seem to be often implying that those folks “don’t care”. And if you care about the subject, maybe reducing it solely to “he helped or didn’t help” is, itself, unhelpful.
And that’s far more undeniable, especially if you do care.
And nowhere did I mention how you felt about this
You made it personal when you said “if you do care”. How I care is how I feel. You certainly made it personal with your last post.
The fact you lead with that bad faith argument and your dozen questions in the previous post indicates your need to (desperately) reframe the narrative of my statements, which is effectively to disagree with objective reality. There can be a broader discussion without trying to discredit the facts I raise. I wonder why you do. I bring them up because at the time the other commenters here were all fine with Gray’s choices, so I posted the consequences of his choices to provide a broader discussion.
The fact that you and others want to fight me on this or consider me “unhelpful” says more about you than it does about me.
Wow that is the biggest pile of straw I’ve ever seen
Nah.
Yah tho
I don’t think we have any particular basis to assume that Gray “doesn’t care” about representation because he chose, in one particular instance, to cast a non-Jewish actor in a Jewish role. Casting is always about balancing a complex array of artistic and practical considerations, and it doesn’t seem all that unreasonable to me that “Can I get one of the most celebrated and bankable dramatic actor in the world to anchor my new prestige piece?” might outweigh “Does his personal background give him a special connection to the material?”—though, obviously, the latter question could in another instance be determinative.
The issue people had wasn’t that he chose one actor, it’s that it was all the actors.
No basis? He chose non-Jewish actors to play Jewish characters. He objectively cared more about that than finding Jewish actors.
A statement can be simplistic and still correct.
Rational adults don’t mistake something like this for an actual “issue”. This is Puritanic whining on Twitter for social clout, stirred up by 20 people. I’d say it’s definitely deniable.
It’s amazing how difficult it is for a certain demographic to comprehend this
What bothers me is that Hollywood seems to have a rule that good-looking Jewish actors can’t play Jewish characters, and good-looking Jewish characters can’t be played by Jews.
That was one of the points Silverman raised in the “Jewface” discussion, and I do think it’s an interesting one vis-à-vis “desirability” being seemingly at odds with Jewishness in Hollywood casting.Then there are the ethnic white actors getting cast as Jews because someone thinks curly hair and a big nose fits the bill, a la Jason Biggs. I watched Quiz Show for the first time last year and I’d put John Turturro’s performance firmly in the Jewface column, especially when compared to the real Herbie Stempel.
I have to disagree. There was a directorial and writing decision to clearly lay out that Stempel was asked/forced to take the fall because he was Jewish. I have not seen enough interviews with Stemple to see how close Turturro got to his persona, but his performance of Stemple still imbued him with dignity and pathos which contrasted perfectly with a major corporations determination to promote an erudite white, upperclass and ultimate fraud.Turturro’s performance as “The Jew” Bernie Bernbaum in Miller’s Crossing was equally brilliant and never close to hideous caricature bordering on Fagan in Oliver Twist.
Paul Newman played Ari Ben Canaan.
I’m not sure pulling one name out of a hat counts as proof of anything. Like, just as a thing, how many Jews has Harrison Ford played? Or, I dunno, Jon Bernthal?
The hat’s name is Wikipedia. And I have to look it up, but isn’t Harrison Ford Jewish?
This whole time, Han was short for “Hanukka”
I’m Hanukka Solman…the macher of the millennium dreidel.
And this is my first mate, Jewy i’m so sorry
Ethnically, his mother was Jewish. But that was the point — are good-looking Jews allowed to play Jews? You brought up Paul Newman, but is he more the exception than the rule? And then I brought up two more handsome Jews who never play Jewish.
his childhood in 1980 Queens —> his childhood in 1980s (?) Queenswith Banks Repeta playing a young version of him and Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong play his parents —> with Banks Repeta playing a young version of him and Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong playing his parentsfrom Johnny point of view —> from Johnny’s point of viewhe’s saying that, since the movie is about his own life and he’s the one making it, then he reserves the right —> he’s saying that, since the movie is about his own life and he’s the one making it, he reserves the right
The film actually is specifically set in the year 1980.
There were Empire Strikes Back posters EVERYWHERE! Rupert Holmes was topping the charts!
The director’s childhood spanned more than one year
I’m still pissed about Ridley Scott not casting an actual alien as the alien in ALIEN. Fucking phonies.
Shooting an American movie in England, he cast more than his fair share of aliens.
Depends on your definition of alien. The alien was played by Bolaji Badejo, a Nigerian studying in England, so an alien of the non-extraterrestrial sort. He actually wasn’t an actor, just extremely tall ( 6’10” or 208 cm) and Scott saw him in a pub and asked him if he’d be in his movie.
So it WAS A MALE HUMAN playing the part of a FEMALE ALIEN?
Did the alien ever declare their pronouns?
Also, the word alien is insulting. She was an undocumented passenger.
At least from this Jew’s perspective, I’m fine with Gray on this because he himself is a fellow Jew, so if that’s his artistic choice, I have no issue. Goyische directors, though? Watch yourselves. Stop casting Adam Driver just because he has a big nose, knowwhaddimean?
How about directors cast whoever they want?Crazy idea, I know.
Not Jewish, but thinking about similar conversations about queer representation, it kind of seems like who’s telling the story and deciding to use these actors makes a pretty big difference. Like if whole ass lesbian Clea DuVall picks Mackenzie Davis to play a lesbian, I think she has her reasons and she’s clearly there guiding the process. If the actor has questions or is struggling to portray something, it’s clear they’re going to someone who can speak from a position of lived experience.If worrying about representation is leading to policing members of the underrepresented groups, then it seems like it’s probably being done wrong.
“whole ass lesbian”?
So nobody wants the most talented actor for the role? They’re acting. If the director has an idea of what they’re looking for, why can’t they use that? It’s not like it’s Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Or Emma Stone in that other movie. Why can’t they go with the best actor for the part? Kathryn Hahn would have been perfect as Joan Rivers. Joan would have loved it.
The trailer for this got heckled at my screening of Tar; I think we were a predominantly Jewish audience. It just looked ridiculous. Someone booed when Anthony Hopkins said “mensch”.
Because of his accent?
Because the whole thing rang false. You can cast Anthony Hopkins in your movie, he’s pretty universally liked afaik, but if you want people to actually buy the performance (and movie tickets) probably don’t have a 100% non-Jewish cast because it was genuinely distracting.
I believe Jeremy Strong is Jewish.
How is Tar?
Tar was great, I’m thinking of seeing it again. Hard to talk about without spoiling though!
No one booed when the native Australian with zero experience in the subject matter or culture of the film came on and put on a distracting silly accent?I jest, but that is the direction these conversations are going – I’m gay, I rarely care when a gay character is played by a straight person, so long as it’s done properly and not to ridicule, a director can cast who they want, I guess audiences have to decide for themselves if it’s something they want to see.
If a conductor was like “this feels so fake to me, I’m not watching it” I’d totally get it.
That’s nearly every musician ever talking about an actor performing music on screen.Except Sound of Metal, in which we get an astonishingly great performance from Riz Ahmed – in a role one could argue was stolen from an actor with hearing difficulties. I appreciate the point you’re making, and to an extent I understand andf empathise due to the whole gay/straight actors arguments, but do we flip the position, and say well, xxx can’t play this role because the character isn’t Jewish?If it’s done earnestly and not to ridicule or denigrate, is there not an argument to use the actor the filmmaker wants?
No one’s actually saying “can’t”. A bunch of people saw a trailer for the movie and booed it. You have two minutes to sell a movie and these actors didn’t. But it is weird to make a movie seemingly about being Jewish in America and not cast any Jews, and if people want to draw conclusions from it that’s fine; if HW constantly tells us representation is important you can’t really fault people for looking at it through that lens.
You keep saying stuff like “100% non-Jewish actors” and “not cast any Jews”, but there are Jewish actors in the movie, including Jeremy Strong, who might not identify as one but is ethnically Jewish. Why are you trying to erase the presence of those Jewish actors just to make a point?
If he doesn’t identify as Jewish he’s not Jewish.
That’s not how race works, sorry. And yet again you only addressed one name and ignore other Jewish actors on this project. I feel like you have some weird agenda here to erase Jewish presence in this movie just to justify your opinion on it. Disgusting.
There’s a link to Gray justifying his decision, but not to anyone actually complaining about it. Perhaps it’s not actually that controversial?
I don’t understand why the controversy is about Anthony Hopkins. Neither is Anne Hathaway Jewish (I dont’ know who Jeremy Strong is) so why is that not a problem >
Being jewish has nothing to do with how you look. There are jews of all skin colors and with ancestry coming from every area of the world. It’s like saying you cant cast a christian to play an atheist, just ridiculous.
He should have casted jewish people for the roles of jewish people. Neil Patrick Harris also played a straight character in HIMYM which is not ok, to name just one example of how this industry ignores this regularly.
He wasn’t out when he was cast.
I get the complaints regarding casting in general but if a Jewish director is casting someone to play his own grandfather, yeah, I think he gets to make that call however he wants.
Yes, it’s called “acting”–taking on a role–such a jewish person.
A Jewish director has to defend his casting of a non-Jewish actor in a Jewish role. lulz…
Why are we not seeing the same concern over Steve Carell playing a Jew in “The Patient”? Honest question. That show dealt very directly with the character’s religion/heritage — and had scenes with him in Auschwitz, for god’s sake. So are we coming after him, too, or is our outrage reserved for Oscar winners? Just seeking clarification.
Not the same, but a similar argument comes up a lot – I’m gay and I honestly don’t care when straight actors play gay if it’s not done in a mocking fashion.Colin Firth in A Single Man remains one of my favourite performances in any movie, I don’t care that he’s not gay; I care that I felt the pain and relief he went through.
Anthony Hopkins played a black man in The Human Stain. This controversy won’t lay a glove on him.
Personally I hate when they cast rich actors as poor people.
I don’t know about you guys, but Armageddon out of this conversation!
but are you getting it?
I am shocked to find that Anthony Hopkins is not Russian, since his was the best filmed portrayal of Pierre Bezukhov that I have seen.
Sean Connery wasn’t Lithuanian.
I would say his Lithuanian accent wasn’t convincing, but then I have no idea how a Lithuanian accent should sound (despite 50% of my ancestry being from there). I’m guessing it shouldn’t sound Scottish, though.
Comr-r-r-r-rade!
As a Jewish actor, I certainly don’t want to lose out on all the non-Jewish parts that are out there. Can’t have it both ways.
I’m not sure anyone suggested that Jewish actors can only play Jewish characters.
If you’re going to say that non-Jews can’t play Jews, then it seems you can easily make the case that Jews can’t play non-Jews.
You can’t though because that would be completely missing the point
The point being?
I mean this is not a new argument, it’s been discussed repeatedly and is pretty much center to the whole topic of representation that the idea is generally to give more opportunities to other groups of people than the white, straight, Gentile, cis, etc. demographic that has typically tended to dominate the film and television industries.
And yet here you are, telling a Jewish filmmaker how his movies should be made. One about his own experiences, no less.Maybe you should consider the kind of company that puts you in.
…of course, this wasn’t the most questionable thing about this movie…
I wonder if we will soon be at a point where when an actor auditions for a job they have to submit their headshot and like an ancestry.com DNA report which shows their family background.
I think it’s a fuzzy line. He is correct, to a large degree, both because it is his own story and because of the subtler elements. As a Jew, though, I do become uncomfortable when I start to feel like an actor is “performing” Judaism or substituting stereotypes for depth. I concede I don’t know where exactly the line is, though. Gray is a phenomenal filmmaker, and has the skill to do it properly (I haven’t seen this film yet, but based on his prior work I trust him to do it right), but I’ve seen performances that fall on the other side of the line as well. And to be fair, even if we’re seeing Anne Hathaway’s face on screen, the fact that this was written and directed by a Jew is not irrelevant; ownership matters, and someone from a marginalized population speaking to their own experiences is relevantly different than someone else trying to speak to experiences they don’t have. (As Gray notes, it would be very different if he were trying to represent the Black kid’s perspective primarily.)Either way, the discussion is worth having. I don’t think the criticism is wholly invalid in principle, even if in this instance it is probably finding the wrong target, but it will take a lot more discussion (and likely a lot of badly-judged examples to analyze) before we really understand where to draw the line between what is valid representation and what is caricature.
Enough of this bullshit. If we go down this road, we’ll discover that about half of screen actors born to Jewish mothers are currently practicing Jews. And what then? We establish a religious activity litmus test? I agree with Silverman that leading roles should be given to Jewish actors whenever possible. But we are getting fucking ridiculous if a supporting role goes to a gentile, or if a supporting role goes to a Jewish actor over a gentile. This is a not a fucking contest. How about: we give all Jewish roles to black actors? Problem solved.