A step backward ?

[deep]

or just an actor playing a part?

As illustrated by the helpful zoom in the lower left-hand corner, the actor you're meant to focus on here is the fellow in the middle. If he doesn't immediately look familiar to you, allow us to jog your memory: You loved him in such films as The Pick-Up Artist, Less Than Zero, and Heart & Souls.

Give up? Yeah, that's Robert Downey Jr. Let's have Entertainment Weekly break it down for us:

[Downey] plays Kirk Lazarus, a very serious Oscar-winning actor cast in the most expensive Vietnam War film ever. Problem is, Lazarus's character, Sgt. Osiris, was originally written as black. So Lazarus decides to dye his skin and play Osiris, um, authentically. Funny? Sure. Dangerous? That's an understatement. ''If it's done right, it could be the type of role you called Peter Sellers to do 35 years ago,'' Downey says. ''If you don't do it right, we're going to hell.''

Tropic Thunder debuts August 15, but we'll only have to wait until March 17 to see the trailer -- which, according to EW, features Downey trying "to bond with a real African-American castmate by quoting the theme song from 'The Jeffersons.'"

 

[vaz02]

Nevermind that, i cant help but stare at Ben Stiller's arm.

 

[corianderstem]

Oh, so it's Soul Man as a Vietnam movie.

 

[the iron horse]

An actor just playing a part >

It's time we throw the crayons away >

and start judging people by their character and not the color of their skin.

It's time to write human being on a form when it ask you your race.

It's time to understand what Dr. Martin Luther King was saying.

 

[sue4u2]

I don't believe this.
And if it's true then he's right -we are all going to hell. or live there a much longer time.

 

[melon]

If African American groups are offended by it, I guess we'll find out soon enough. Beyond that, I'm not about to put any words into their mouths, as I am not black.

Stiller has cited focus groups, however, where black audiences have not been offended and have found it funny. I do not believe that his intentions are malicious whatsoever.

 

[anitram]

It looks like a white man wearing make up.

 

[sue4u2]

Honestly, I love Ben Stiller and have always loved Robert Downey, Jr.
but still.. it doesn't sit right with me.
What?? they can't get a funny black man to play the part?
If it's a comedy or satire, then I'll just have to see it, I guess.

 

[corianderstem]

but still.. it doesn't sit right with me.
What?? they can't get a funny black man to play the part?

You might need to read the original post again - Downey being a white actor isn't the point.

The character he's playing is an actor playing a role written for a black man.

The point isn't about the casting of Stiller's movie, it's about this particular plot point in the story.

... unless you realize that and your comment is directed at the characters in the movie as well.

(It took me ages to write this post so that it made an ounce of sense, and I still can't decide if I'm reading Sue's post right or not. It's late. I should just go to bed. )

 

[Iskra]

Honestly, I love Ben Stiller and have always loved Robert Downey, Jr.
but still.. it doesn't sit right with me.
What?? they can't get a funny black man to play the part?
If it's a comedy or satire, then I'll just have to see it, I guess.

Why would they get a black man to play the part?
The joke is that he is such a method actor that he "becomes" black to play the part.
It's making fun of actors not black or white.
Good God, you haven't even seen the movie.
Just bringing this up is manufacturing controversy.
Here let me post this and ask if anyone is offended to stir things up...

 

[BVS]

How is it any different from Dave Chappelle playing a white man?

 

[No spoken words]

Um.

There's nothing here. At all.

Downey's character is a white man. An actor.

Who decides that he will play an upcoming role as a black man, because the original script called for the character to be black.

What's the problem?

 

[deep]

How is it any different from Dave Chappelle playing a white man?

or the "white chicks" movie might be the next question?



Was this country founded on institutionalize racism against the white people Chappel was depicting?

When Chappel washes the white grease paint off his face,
Can he walk down the street as easily, and with as much nonchalance,
as you and I?


If the answers to these questions are “yes”.

Than I will say,
"there is no difference"



but back to this particular film

and the way this character is drawn.

There is much less to be offended about,
Than with the "white actors" that portrayed the "Amos and Andy" caricatures of years past.

or even the C Thomas Howell character in "Soul Man"

 

[sue4u2]

The character he's playing is an actor playing a role written for a black man.

(It took me ages to write this post so that it made an ounce of sense, and I still can't decide if I'm reading Sue's post right or not. It's late. I should just go to bed. )

You were reading it right.. I was tired last night too.
I misunderstood..but I get it now..

 

[BVS]

Was this country founded on institutionalize racism against the white people Chappel was depicting?

When Chappel washes the white grease paint off his face,
Can he walk down the street as easily, and with as much nonchalance,
as you and I?

Well I was speaking in the sense of this paticular film...

I think this film, at least from what I gather is much different than the "black face" films of the past.

 

[INDY500]

Can't be worse than The Wiz.

 

[LarryMullen's POPAngel]

I don't see what the big deal is, especially when it's clear it wasn't done maliciously and Stiller even went so far as to test the film on black audiences.

 

[MaxFisher]

the trailer

http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809912814/video/7004235