This summer, three of the most prestigious Shakespeare companies around the world staged the play “Richard III.” Each took a different approach to casting the title character. This caused quite some debate in the entertainment world over how or which actors should play which roles.
At the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, Richard was played by Arthur Hughes, who has radial dysplasia, a condition where bones of the arm do not grow normally when the baby is developing in the womb. The company said it was the first time it had cast a disabled actor to play the character, who describes himself in the opening scene as “deformed.”
The production’s director, Gregory Doran, who was until recently the Royal Shakespeare’s artistic director, told The Times of London earlier this year that having actors pretend to be disabled to play the character would “probably not be acceptable” these days.
The Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada, cast Colm Feore, who is not disabled, to play Richard with the character having a deformed spine. This is different from the original Richard, who was a hunchback. And in New York City, the Public Theater’s Free Shakespeare in the Park cast Danai Gurira, a Black woman who does not have a disability, as the duke who schemes and kills his way to the throne of England.
These recent castings have led to many rethinking the cultural norms around identity, representation, diversity, opportunity, imagination, and artistic license and have led to heated debates over who can or should be casted for different roles.
It has been decades since major theaters have had white actors play Othello in blackface, and, after years of criticism, performances by white actors playing Asian roles are growing rarer in theater and film and are being rethought in opera and ballet.
While many celebrate the move away from old, sometimes stereotyped portrayals and the new opportunities being given to actors from diverse backgrounds, others worry that the current stance on literalism and authenticity can be too constraining.
“The essential nature of art is freedom,” said the Oscar-winning actor F. Murray Abraham, who has starred as Shylock, the Jewish moneylender in Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice,” though Abrham himself is not Jewish. “Once we impose any kind of control over it, it’s no longer free.”
Link to article: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/28/theater/richard-iii-casting-debates.html
At the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, Richard was played by Arthur Hughes, who has radial dysplasia, a condition where bones of the arm do not grow normally when the baby is developing in the womb. The company said it was the first time it had cast a disabled actor to play the character, who describes himself in the opening scene as “deformed.”
The production’s director, Gregory Doran, who was until recently the Royal Shakespeare’s artistic director, told The Times of London earlier this year that having actors pretend to be disabled to play the character would “probably not be acceptable” these days.
The Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada, cast Colm Feore, who is not disabled, to play Richard with the character having a deformed spine. This is different from the original Richard, who was a hunchback. And in New York City, the Public Theater’s Free Shakespeare in the Park cast Danai Gurira, a Black woman who does not have a disability, as the duke who schemes and kills his way to the throne of England.
These recent castings have led to many rethinking the cultural norms around identity, representation, diversity, opportunity, imagination, and artistic license and have led to heated debates over who can or should be casted for different roles.
It has been decades since major theaters have had white actors play Othello in blackface, and, after years of criticism, performances by white actors playing Asian roles are growing rarer in theater and film and are being rethought in opera and ballet.
While many celebrate the move away from old, sometimes stereotyped portrayals and the new opportunities being given to actors from diverse backgrounds, others worry that the current stance on literalism and authenticity can be too constraining.
“The essential nature of art is freedom,” said the Oscar-winning actor F. Murray Abraham, who has starred as Shylock, the Jewish moneylender in Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice,” though Abrham himself is not Jewish. “Once we impose any kind of control over it, it’s no longer free.”
Link to article: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/28/theater/richard-iii-casting-debates.html
