In many of his movies & on stage Tony Randell proved he was a gifted actor. But in The 7 Faces of Doctor Lao he showed every one in and out of the field of entertainment how to absorb the personage of any charactor along with the correct language skills. Telling an actor you cant play an any part because you're look is not correct in most (not all) cases is thinking with a limited mindset.
But "Dr. Lao" changes races. No matter what human plays him, he is going to have to adopt the characteristics of another race. If a Chinese actor played "Dr. Lao" he would have had to do "European Face." Are we now at a place where we are so regimented by ethnic/gender ideology that no actor can play anything but their own familial background? The actress who played Maria in the last version of West Side Story was half Columbian/half Polish and not one bit Puerto Rican. Was that okay? How far do we want to go with this? Can only gay actors play gay parts? Well, then can only straight actors play straight parts? Do we want to exclude anyone gay from playing anyone straight? I don't mean to be disrespectful to the speaker or to anyone else. I'm just wondering how we navigate such a nebulous territory.
It's rather fascinating to me how people forget what film and theatre are all about. It's called "acting". That means that anyone can take on any part and play any role, any race, any sex, any age, anything. That's why make up was invented/developed. And now, with digital make up, anyone can play anyTHING. Any actor could conceivably play an animated chair or car, anything, provided the script is well written. That's why it's called ACTING.
It’s astonishing to me that no one so much as mentioned the source material.
In many of his movies & on stage Tony Randell proved he was a gifted actor. But in The 7 Faces of Doctor Lao he showed every one in and out of the field of entertainment how to absorb the personage of any charactor along with the correct language skills. Telling an actor you cant play an any part because you're look is not correct in most (not all) cases is thinking with a limited mindset.
But "Dr. Lao" changes races. No matter what human plays him, he is going to have to adopt the characteristics of another race. If a Chinese actor played "Dr. Lao" he would have had to do "European Face." Are we now at a place where we are so regimented by ethnic/gender ideology that no actor can play anything but their own familial background? The actress who played Maria in the last version of West Side Story was half Columbian/half Polish and not one bit Puerto Rican. Was that okay? How far do we want to go with this? Can only gay actors play gay parts? Well, then can only straight actors play straight parts? Do we want to exclude anyone gay from playing anyone straight? I don't mean to be disrespectful to the speaker or to anyone else. I'm just wondering how we navigate such a nebulous territory.
It's rather fascinating to me how people forget what film and theatre are all about. It's called "acting". That means that anyone can take on any part and play any role, any race, any sex, any age, anything. That's why make up was invented/developed. And now, with digital make up, anyone can play anyTHING. Any actor could conceivably play an animated chair or car, anything, provided the script is well written. That's why it's called ACTING.