Trans actors can play cis but cis can't play trans. Why am I bothering to try and see the sense?

Glenda Jackson played Lear, in Hamilton a black actor plays George Washington, and that’s before we get started on every panto in the land..,

Why can’t a male actor play someone with a male body who is a trans woman? Because actually how can we even tell how the character or actor feel inside? Except by what they do and say on stage.

Actors are cast for their physical looks or how their bodies can be made to look, so generally by age, height, physique, skin tone etc, and then the actor, wig, costume and make up department do the rest.

I do get that Trans Actors would feel frustrated, but really, if a Trans woman can get a role as The Mother, ‘a woman’ then there is work for trans actors.

To continue that thought, I've seen quite a lot of 'stage for screen' RSC productions in the last few years, pretty sure all of them had some swapping around - sometimes it might be making a point (Oberon and Titania swapping lines changed the dynamic and the former romping lustily with Bottom was fun) and sometimes it really didn't matter but resulted in a powerful performance (Kathryn Hunter as Timon of Athens for instance). I could do without the introduction where they always have to mention 'gender' in a special reverential sort of voice ... if you've heard this sort of thing I'm sure you'll know what I mean. But the productions were all fine.

How many Zoroastrian parts are there?

Is Remi Malik a Zoroastrian?

The problem is how many trans roles can you think of

There are many roles in which the sex (and/or gender) of the character are immaterial to the story, and women have started making some headway on successfully making their case to play parts which would in the past have defaulted to men. I would suggest that talented transgender actors should endeavour to do likewise.

The problem is how many trans roles can you think of.

Trans people represent a very small part of the population. I do not agree that they are dramatically underrepresented in the media. Even if that were so, I don't see the logic in saying a play which clearly isn't ignoring trans people can't cast who it wants.

The terminology has taken years to change but now we see a father as a man who fits the role and not in a biological sense.

Do we? I don't think people do.

But leaving that aside, that still makes no sense. Can my husband decide that he is father to some random child then? He's very fond my my nephew, and my nephew looks up to him. Is he my nephew's father? Sounds like he fits your description.

They say it's an inner feeling.

So it's like saying only Catholics can play Catholics.

...And what about Jessie Buckley's accent in Wild Rose? She surely passes.

The only good thing to come out of this sort of crap is that the trans activists are shooting themselves in the foot (feet?) as the whole rationale behind their campaign was to keep a low profile and eschew publicity thereby sneaking all the insanity through under the radar. That's going well isn't it?

There are a lot of people who already accept these arguments about things like race though. Any America progressive will think this is exactly the same thing.

OK it seems I didn't realise the lack of understanding I was dealing with

You lack manners

I've only read the BBC article. And this is nonsense.

It's not like saying your should cast a black actor as a black character. That's a visible, obvious thing. It's saying you should cast someone based on their mysterious inner essence identity, which no one in the audience will be able to see and anyway, shouldn't because the actor is playing a part... of a 'transwoman' who is, by definition, a male bodied human.

Do these people really think that others look at a pre-anything male trans person and see anything other than a male? Do they think we all possess Layla Moran style soul goggles?

Mind you, I know nothing, I thought Chris Pine's Scots accent was passable.

BBC article seems quite straightforward on this one.

They went to some lengths to look for a transwoman actress for the role but couldn't find one good enough. So they cast a man. What else were they to do? By the sounds of it the character also appears pre transition, and is actually male, so it would be nonsense to cast a woman.

I did initially have some sympathy, because trans actors may find it difficult to get traditional male/female leading roles due to not passing well, so some evening up seems fair enough. But going by the BBC article it sounds like significant efforts were made to find a trans actor and noone good enough appeared. That is entirely fair I think - if you were casting a disabled part and no good enough disabled actors applied, you'd be reasonable to cast an able bodied actor.

And TG campaigners do indeed object because casting a male as a male character is too realistic. Couldn't make it up. Are they trying to say that transwomen who don't take hormones/have surgery are not trans enough to appear on stage even in the role of ... a transwoman who doesn't take hormones or have surgery? What else do they think the difference between a transwoman and a man in a dress is? I thought it was supposed to be purely in your head, in which case who cares, nobody expects an actor to think like the character, they just have to act like them.

Well, we generally call that a stepfather.

@isabellerossgnoi

In the same way as a man can be called a father even if he did'nt' father the kids he is with.
The terminology has taken years to change but now we see a father as a man who fits the role and not in a biological sense.

@donquixtodelamancha

The problem is how many trans roles can you think of.
here are hundred and thousands of characters in films and shows produced this year- how many can you name that are transgender?
How would you feel then if the ones that are available are played by other actors?

I guess you need an iPhone to get the full effect...

🦹‍♀️🦹🦹‍♂️👩‍⚖️🧑‍⚖️👨‍⚖️👩‍🚒🧑‍🚒👨‍🚒👩‍🔬🧑‍🔬👨‍🔬👩‍🎨🧑‍🎨👨‍🎨👩‍🔧🧑‍🔧👨‍🔧👩‍🏭🧑‍🏭👨‍🏭👩‍🏫🧑‍🏫👨‍🏫

Is this what I think it is? Jesus it took years to get a bloody red haired icon...
👩🏼‍🦰

Or Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything ..... a History of Art grad playing a cosmologist

And playing a disabled character from half way through the film . I don’t think that Equity allow actors to be rendered neurologically impaired in the interests of purity casting.

there are so few roles for transgender ppl, that having one that is specifically written for them played by someone who then played by someone else would be a slap in the face. Having a mother played by a transgender is not a comparison.

Well thanks to this shitstorm it now seems likely that there'll be even fewer. Who needs to tiptoe around this minefield when they're simply in the business of staging the performing arts?

And that's how the lobbyists - and this actor [a term I use generically to mean both male and female performers] is clearly one - respond to the very 'woke' theatrical world who even redesignate their women's cloakrooms to appease their vocal agenda. Accusations of 'literal violence'.

Honestly. Who would bother?

@Reginabambina
Apologies if I had stated it incorrectly put I hope my meaning is understood.

I’m a bit worried by the current fashion for zombie tv shows... wibble... 😥🧟‍♀️🧟🧟‍♂️ Arggggggggh! most of my little icon Smiley people have procreated - and there now a male, female +1 other! Oh my god. They’ve been got at too.

I don’t know if there’s any Key & Peele fans around:
m.youtube.com/watch?v=lgYfRGDiPDs

The dinosaurs were quite literally murdered by the small mammals who denied their existence after the comet hit.

While I agree that this is pushing things too far, I do wonder what some people are advocating for...

Back to the days of Marlon Brando and Mickey Rooney playing Asian characters?

Or further back, and all parts played by men?

After all, the film industry is pretty sure that white men are always the most talented and the biggest draws at the box office (and the fact that they get most of the parts and direct 90% of studio films has nothing to do with it).

Don’t they know what the unemployment rates are like for velociraptors? I know any number of them who’d have had Spielbergs arm off for the chance of a part