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Why Is a White Actor Playing 'Prince of Persia' Title Role?

Ben Kingsley played Ghandi!
RACIST CASTING!!!!!!!

Go watch some old episodes of Hawaii 5-0 for some WTF casting.
Mark Lenard and Ricardo Mantalban with rubber eye makeup as Japanese.
Various white guys as Hawaiians.
Japanese and Korean actors playing Chinese
Chinese and Korean actors playing Japanese
Chinese and Japanese actors playing Korean
RACIST CASTING!!

Mel Gibson as William Wallace! He's not even Scottish!
RACIST CASTING!!

Obviously I'm starting to go in the opposite ludicrous direction as the other extreme suggestions. The point being, Where do you draw the line?
 
stueyross said:
How about Said from Lost? He would have been good. But then he'd have killed everyone in the first 5 minutes.
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Naveen Andrews is of Indian descent and too dark to even play an Iraqi (I remember all the complaints about that), much less a Persian, who in general are somewhat lighter-skinned than Arabs, judging from my admittedly scattershot observations.

Mel Gibson as William Wallace! He's not even Scottish!
RACIST CASTING!!
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:rommie:
 
Dusty Ayers said:
Except that Chow Yun Fat is Asian, and that worked for him in his favour, even if the story was (and is) wack; nobody had any objections to him being King Mongkut, although most people hated the story because it is historically inacurate.
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And Gyllenhall is caucasian, just like Persians. If any Asian actor can play any Asian character, even if they do not share the ethnic and cultural background as the character, then the same is true for caucasians.
And IIRC, there were people of Thai decent who did object to their revered King being played by a Chinese actor.
 
Servo said:
I bet all you fuckers crying racism over Gyllenhaal playing a Persian, still find Fisher Stevens portrayal of Ben Jahrvi in the Short Circuit films hilarious.
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No, I sure as fuck didn't, and neither did the writers (S.S. Wilson & Brent Maddock), who saw Tri-Star kill everything they had previously written just because the Tri-Star executives were and are slime balls. There was an interview in Starlog about the time the movie came out showing how pissed off they were about all of the changes forced on them by the higher-ups at Tri-Star (Ben Jahrvi wasn't even their creation; they were told to create a sidekick for Steve Guttenberg's character Newton Crosby that would act like 'a crazy Indian'.) That's the reason I can't really watch Short Circuit and Short Circuit 2 nowadays, or The Party.

Nerys Myk said:
And IIRC, there were people of Thai decent who did object to their revered King being played by a Chinese actor.
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I stand corrected-thanks, Nerys.
 
Greg Cox said:
Besides, everyone knows Naveen Andrews needs to play Khan in a new STAR TREK movie. :)
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Since Khan is Sikh, Andrews would look the part far more than Montelban ever did.

However, I'd love to see Sendhil Ramamurthy given a crack at the role. If anyone looks like the pinnacle of genetically engineered human perfection, it's that guy. :rommie:
 
Nerys Myk said:
And Gyllenhall is caucasian, just like Persians.
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Indeed.

In fact, when does Prince of Persia take place? If he's the prince, he should perhaps be ethnically Kurdish, with Azeri, Georgian, and Circassian thrown in (three out of those four are also honky ethnicities). Which kind of puts the "Prince of Persia should be Persian!" thing in perspective.

If any Asian actor can play any Asian character, even if they do not share the ethnic and cultural background as the character, then the same is true for caucasians.
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I dunno. It does slightly bother me that they cast, say, Koreans as Japanese when all they need to do is change a name. For example, Linda Park as Hoshi Sato instead of Kim Jin-sook or something--but they couldn't even be bothered to get the name order right there, I guess it's important for make-pretend aliens like Bajorans, but not real cultures...

But, on the other hand, who cares? If the phenotype matches, play ball. That's probably the best statement of the general rule.
 
I always wonder while watching episodes of Hawaii 5-0, which featured Asian actors who were actually involved in WWII, if (for example) the Chinese actors held any personal distaste at playing Japanese characters.
 
Apparently everyone is so outraged over Gyllenhaal's blinding whiteness that audiences are staying away from the movie in droves and would rather watch vapid women go shopping for shoes or the adventures of an animated troll.

It does slightly bother me that they cast, say, Koreans as Japanese when all they need to do is change a name. For example, Linda Park as Hoshi Sato instead of Kim Jin-sook or something
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I think they usually write the role and the name before they cast the part, and if the role is Japanese, they look for an actor who can pass for Japanese. To actually say they must be of Japanese ancestry would be overly limiting (their priority has to be, best actor for the role), kinda creepy, and an insult to the very idea of acting. If someone of Korean ancestry absolutely cannot play someone of Japanese ancestry, that doesn't say much for their acting ability.

Plus, how are they going to cast the Klingons, Vulcans, Bajorans et al? ;)
 
I have two coworkers who are Iranian, and while they're not quite as white as I am, they are definitely white. One is darker than the other but you would definitely not confuse them for Arabs or anyone darker.

I don't really see a problem with the casting here.
 
Temis the Vorta said:
It does slightly bother me that they cast, say, Koreans as Japanese when all they need to do is change a name. For example, Linda Park as Hoshi Sato instead of Kim Jin-sook or something
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I think they usually write the role and the name before they cast the part, and if the role is Japanese, they look for an actor who can pass for Japanese. To actually say they must be of Japanese ancestry would be overly limiting (their priority has to be, best actor for the role), kinda creepy, and an insult to the very idea of acting.
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You can't really tell me that Hoshi Sato's ethnicity was a vital component to Enterprise. (Actually, you'd be hard-pressed to say that Hoshi Sato herself was, but that's neither here nor there. :p )

Like I say, it's phenotypically sound, it's just a minor worry. Koreans are subject to a fair amount of xenophobia and chauvinism in Japan, and the historical relationship is extremely bitter, so I project that onto it. I realize I can't speak for Linda Park or any other ethnic Korean or Chinese who has been tasked to play a Japanese character, and I don't think if I were in their shoes I would particularly give a crap myself, but I can see why someone might. I dunno, I guess it's not well-founded. -_-

Also, there's the whole notion of Americans forgetting there are other countries in Asia besides Japan and China and other Asian ethnicities besides Japanese and Chinese. Despite the fact we've fought four wars over there, involving every country in the hemisphere.

Plus, how are they going to cast the Klingons, Vulcans, Bajorans et al? ;)
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More funding for NASA?
 
You can't really tell me that Hoshi Sato's ethnicity was a vital component to Enterprise.
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Well to the writers, I'm sure it was. Any detail they assign to a character is vital to them, or else why did they write it? (I'm ignoring any issues with the quality of writing for this show - let's pretend that the writers really are geniuses and every idea that pops into their brain is sheer brilliance.)

So the writers say, "the character is Japanese" and turn it over to the casting dept. The casting dept doesn't have the right to turn around and say, "the best actor for the job is Korean, so make the character Korean instead." They'd be waaaay outta line there, just as the writers would be waaaay outta line to reply that "no, she's Japanese, so find the best actor of Japanese ancestry for the role, regardless whether you think that's the best person for the job."

Like every business, each department has its territory and they guard that territory fiercely. Nobody likes people from another department stepping on their toes. That's true for a company that makes dog food or plumbing supplies, but it goes quadruple for the political hotbed of Hollywood.

Koreans are subject to a fair amount of xenophobia and chauvinism in Japan, and the historical relationship is extremely bitter,
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That ain't nothin' compared with the shitstorm that ensues when one department on a Hollywood production starts telling another department how to do their job. :rommie:

Also, there's the whole notion of Americans forgetting there are other countries in Asia besides Japan and China and other Asian ethnicities besides Japanese and Chinese.
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It has more to do with the acting talent supply. For whatever reason, there tends to be a lot of actors in LA of Korean ancestry. I know the Japanese population in California isn't nearly as big as Chinese, maybe not as big as Korean at this point. There's been Korean immigration for the past few decades but Japanese immigration ended decades ago. There's bound to be more Japanese roles than actual actors of Japanese ancestry to fill those roles.
 
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