Political Correctness Has Missed Transgender?

[Prospero]

Two or three entangled issues here.
1. Shortage of roles offered to TS actresses
2. Shortage of good ts actress (is there? I don't know)
3. Casting GG as transexuals... why in this day and age!
4. Why should a good actress who happens to be transexual be confined to the ghetto of portraying transexuals as opposed to simply being offered good female roles? Surely the journey is to womanhood and a TS actress would want to be judged for her ability to portray a female - in a thriller, a love story, a sci fi epic, a historical epic, a comedy or whatever. This would be real integration and acceptance (without hiding or denying who she is)

[amberskyi]

that's actually how films get financing and distribution. the character doesn't have to dress in full kente clothing with a spear riding an elephant, but distributors want to know his african without him saying so. so they'll get an actor like don cheedle and ask him to do an african accent exactly like he did in hotel rwanda. now- does everyone in africa talk like that? in fact, the character that cheedle plays, paul rusesabagina speaks a more british english. but cheedle (and the director) have to make this accessible to everyone and such details are usually overlooked for something more contemporary.

in the same way, not every transsexual "sounds" like a gg so mainstream cinema and television will always go for what "everyone" thinks they sound like. that's what distributors and producers want.

if you want something more realistic, perhaps you should start supporting independent film which will take chances and even feature stories that people actually care about. everything else your talking about is done for profit first and entertainment- never education or information.

but you know what? perhaps lana wachowski in the near future with do trannies a solid and feature an all sci-fi transsexual cast in a blockbuster feature.

I'm actually all for idie films, mostly horror tho.
To me this issue is not that different from the stereotypical roles that blacks and latinos often get in hollywood.fuck popular perception.popular perception does not equal right

[Cecil Rhodes]

Love / Jamie Clayton on Vimeo

[MacShreach]

Two or three entangled issues here.
1. Shortage of roles offered to TS actresses
2. Shortage of good ts actress (is there? I don't know)
3. Casting GG as transexuals... why in this day and age!
4. Why should a good actress who happens to be transexual be confined to the ghetto of portraying transexuals as opposed to simply being offered good female roles? Surely the journey is to womanhood and a TS actress would want to be judged for her ability to portray a female - in a thriller, a love story, a sci fi epic, a historical epic, a comedy or whatever. This would be real integration and acceptance (without hiding or denying who she is)

Yeah...but.

1 yes, because there is a shortage of decent scripts because writers don't produce material with TS as centrepieces because they don't see it as commercialy viable. (You could buy The Warm Pink Jelly Express Train ebook for $2.50 and buck this trend. Make it worth my while, I'll write more. Get stuff like this noticed, movie producers will pay attention. Simples.)

2. Possible; partly because of 1, not enough material to work in, so no way to gain necessary experience. However an established route into acting is through mainsream modelling and there are now a few TS models.

3 I agree totally, but when you're running a production budget of millions you need guaranteed deliverers, and 1&2 above already compromise the availability of said

4 Goes without saying. However, the TS actresses whom there are came in through TS-specific roles and that is unlikely to change for the foreseeable.Clearly in an ideal world, no-one would pay a blind bit of notice as to whether a woman was trans or cis, they'd just watch her act.

The upshot is that for there to be more TS actresses, there needs to be more material for them to play, which means there must be an established audience, which brings me back to my response to 1 above.

You only have to go back to the fifties to see a time when there were very very few blackfilm actors and really no black male leads. With changing social conditions, more roles came up, giving black actors and actresses the opportunity to develop their skills, until now, when there is simply no question that some of the best and most bankable movie stars are black. There are many similarities, even if they are not completely analogous cases. /rant

[bluesoul]

fuck popular perception.popular perception does not equal right

i don't think you understand. they don't care about being right or wrong. they only care about making money. you really think they're going to invest $50 million plus to say fuck popular perception?

besides- hasn't tyler perry built a career from stereotyping black people?

[bluesoul]

Two or three entangled issues here.
1. Shortage of roles offered to TS actresses
2. Shortage of good ts actress (is there? I don't know)
3. Casting GG as transexuals... why in this day and age!
4. Why should a good actress who happens to be transexual be confined to the ghetto of portraying transexuals as opposed to simply being offered good female roles? Surely the journey is to womanhood and a TS actress would want to be judged for her ability to portray a female - in a thriller, a love story, a sci fi epic, a historical epic, a comedy or whatever. This would be real integration and acceptance (without hiding or denying who she is)

i thought you work in film.

1. this is n/a. any role can be changed to fit any character. there is currently no demand to make characters transsexual
2. actually, it's more likely nobody is willing to invest for a major motion picture with a transsexual as the lead (or supporting). it is also possibly nobody looking to invest in a transsexual actor (or there is and they cannot succeed doing so because of reason in 1)
3. it's called acting- you know, the same way they got an irish guy to play oskar schindler (a german native)
4. check reasons 1 + 2

[MacShreach]

i thought you work in film.

1. this is n/a. any role can be changed to fit any character. there is currently no demand to make characters transsexual
2. actually, it's more likely nobody is willing to invest for a major motion picture with a transsexual as the lead (or supporting). it is also possibly nobody looking to invest in a transsexual actor (or there is and they cannot succeed doing so because of reason in 1)
3. it's called acting- you know, the same way they got an irish guy to play oskar schindler (a german native)
4. check reasons 1 + 2

Yup. 'no demand' and 'nobody willing to invest' because of it. When producers think it's a profitable move they'll do itall right.

[amberskyi]

Hollywood is mostly shit anyway

[bluesoul]

^^ wrong. making money is the shit

[starkem]

Hmmm...interesting indeed. Reality versus perception and profitability/preferability versus perfection/perception. Talent and creativity will ultimately make these arguments moot. However, all political correction must enter through a stage of the hypothetical; generate awareness through talent, creativity; and, ultimately, present viable alternative profitability and practicality for the targeted entertainment industry to make concrete change happen.

The dilemma here is the willingness of non-trans persons to work with transgendered persons -and for all of the practical reasons heretofore mentioned (however unpopular or rejected as practical reasons) the change necessary may not be in the interest of such an industry. There is, however, an instaneous injustice in allowing a female born person to play a role centered on a character based upon transgendered origin. That fight is within our grasp for those similarly affected as such.

Misrepresentation of any issues suggests an injustice for which the patience of the passage of time to correct is intolerable. It is such an empassioned intolerance for which sympathy and understanding is not needed to demand correction or convey discontent. Yet, no anger or argument is as resolute as building your own Hollywood. India does it. Supporting transgender talents in their personal ventures is another self-empowering method of correction. These methods are not easily attained; yet, it would be more successful than the back and forth with people incapable of such considerations.