: Among the many surprises of the second season of Apple TV+'s "The Morning Show" is Reese Witherspoon's Bradley Jackson exploring her fluid sexuality with another woman. Julianna Margulies' Laura Peterson is an out-and-proud lesbian journalist at the fictional UBA network who lost her job shortly after being outed in the '90s.
Thursday, November 04, 2021
Who gets to play who on screen? The queer question of Julianna Margulies on "The Morning show"
Salon.com
: Among the many surprises of the second season of Apple TV+'s "The Morning Show" is Reese Witherspoon's Bradley Jackson exploring her fluid sexuality with another woman. Julianna Margulies' Laura Peterson is an out-and-proud lesbian journalist at the fictional UBA network who lost her job shortly after being outed in the '90s.
: Among the many surprises of the second season of Apple TV+'s "The Morning Show" is Reese Witherspoon's Bradley Jackson exploring her fluid sexuality with another woman. Julianna Margulies' Laura Peterson is an out-and-proud lesbian journalist at the fictional UBA network who lost her job shortly after being outed in the '90s.
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This article makes me think a lot about queer representation in terms of actors behind queer characters on screen. The immediate question "can straight actors play queer characters" comes to mind, and to be honest, I am not exactly sure where I stand on this. I believe there is a lot of complexity to the question that has to be considered. For starters, sexuality is not something that can visibly be recognized. A closeted actor might be perceived as straight, but might actually be queer, and then would be authentically playing a queer character to some extent. You also must consider the difference between a closeted and out character. When someone is comfortable with their sexuality, they will express that differently than someone who is closeted. I think the problem often arises when straight actors rely on stereotypes to portray a queer character. Being overly feminine or flamboyant or predatory are stereotypes that cause harm to the lgbtq+ community. An argument I often hear for letting straight actors play queer characters is "well thats just acting. being someone you aren't". To some extent, yes I agree, however when that acting is supposed to be representing a group that is often misrepresented, underrepresented, and oppressed, I believe the character of that group should be approached as respectfully as possible. To do this, it has to be authentic, and come from an authentic place, which can only be done if the actor is queer. So I guess I know where I stand now.
The question of who plays queer characters and who doesn’t is a very perplexing one. One of the common arguments is to not assume the sexuality of the actor, but then in the same sentence, they will reassure you that they are in fact straight. But in contrast, queer actors constantly get asked to talk about and give details on their sexualities but when straight actors are presented with the same questions it makes them uncomfortable and upset. That’s just one interesting aspect of the problem. The other is that often gay actors only get cast in queer roles. Often with queer representation, the character is very one-note, as mentioned many of these casting choices are not a thing of the past and neither is the stereotyping. So many queer actors have to endlessly play the sassy gay best friend or the butch lesbian and trans representation doesn’t even exist. The question of queer representation is such a nuanced one and everyone, including myself even as a queer person, are unsure of its answer.
I have always found the topic of casting very intriguing but equally tough to handle. We all have grown up in a society where films have had white, cisgender performers playing all sorts of characters, which is so unfair to performers who actually have more in common with those characters. The article rightly points out that people with disabilities, people of color etc. have to work harder to get roles in general, and then when parts that are rightfully theirs are not given to them only for a white, cisgender person to come and play them is just uncalled for. Now one can argue that maybe those white performers are better artists and can play the part better but that, to me, is still not a good enough reason. I am truly of the opinion that however great of a performer one may be, nothing beats someone who basically lives the life of the character that is being played.
This is a very nuanced topic with grey area in some cases, while other cases definitely seem more inappropriate. For example, white actors playing nnwhite characters; she’s since expressed that taking the role was a bad decision, but I think of Emma Stone’s portrayal of a character in the movie Aloha who is written as a quarter Chinese and a quarter Hawaiian. In this case, it was a deliberate choice to represent the character as completely white, and took an opportunity away from AAPI actors. In this instance of a straight actress playing a lesbian character I don’t think it is necessarily inappropriate, because of how sexuality can be less visible and more fluid or personal, but it is frustrating to see straight actors have opportunities to play gay characters meanwhile gay actors don’t get the same amount of crossover. Darren Criss is an example of a straight actor who played gay characters for a long time, then took those roles less often because he felt he was doing a disservice to the gay community.
This question gets asked a lot. I think that’s because there’s really no good answer to it. On the one hand (for queer representation), it can be harmful to say “only gay actors can play gay characters”. How do you prove that? Do you force gay actors and performers to out themselves in order to make a living? And does that mean they can’t play straight characters, which in general dominate the types of roles available in the film, theatre and TV industry? On the other hand, asking for more queer roles portrayed by actual queer people is important. Communities need to see themselves represented on screen, but also need to be represented by themselves. We can’t have solely cishet actors in every single queer role, not only because they would never fully understand the experience they are trying to represent, but because that takes jobs away from queer actors. Like I said, it’s a difficult question.
There is a lot to breakdown in this article and I don’t have enough words to go into all the detail so I will just focus on two points. This slippery slope fallacy is a really bad argument. There is a very clear difference between a straight actor playing a gay actor or an able-bodied actor playing a disabled actor and a mom playing a woman with no children or a gay actor playing a straight actor. Straight people, able-bodied people, people without children aren’t persecuted. That’s the line. This is not a slippery slope; it is a two-step platform. There are persecuted people and non-persecuted people and actors who do not fall into persecuted categories should not play roles that do. It takes away jobs from actors that do fall into these categories and have the lived experiences that no amount of skill or training could replicate. Also, while we shouldn’t force people to out themselves to play queer roles, I am not here for straight people using that as a bad faith argument as to why they should be allowed to play queer roles. It feels very disingenuous for someone like Margulies to be like “you don’t know my life. I might be a little queer so I can play whoever I want to play.”
This article identified many gray areas I didn’t realize in the casting industry when it comes to representing identities. A point that I found especially interesting was how it was argued that an actor should have personal experience pertaining the role they have to play. In the article, the response to that is that the public doesn’t necessarily know someone’s private personal history, so how can they judge whether it is acceptable for them to play the role. I never really noticed this ambiguity before in that actors are not required to disclose such personal history, so it is up to them to step down when they recognize it is not right for them to play a certain role (demonstrated by some actors mentioned in this article). In the theatre industry, I think this brings up an equally important issue of misrepresentation and will influence how casting directors do their job in the future.
Topics like this can get so nuanced that sometimes it really is sort of "I'll know it when I see it" situation. It is very easy to get trapped in the rhetoric of straight people shouldn't play gay characters, cis people shouldn't play gay characters, et cetera; it is also fair to say that people should not have to out themselves in order to play or not play a particular role (which, of course, is an argument that may be used in bad faith in order to secure a certain role). I do not think there is a hard and fast rule about this type of stuff when it comes to casting, but I do firmly believe in giving roles with specified identities to people with those identities where possible (which probably is not a hot take whatsoever but bears saying). The problem is that cishet actors are disproportionately favored no matter what the role is, which is really what needs to change.
This is a question I’ve seen paraded around for years and everyone has different opinions on it. I personally think that it shouldn’t really matter the sexuality or gender of the actor playing a role for most applications. It’s not always safe being out as LGBTQ+ in that industry, and I don’t think we should be forcing actors to have to come out just for our comfort. Sexuality is also often fluid and complicated, and the labels that we use can often change. However I agree that it’s nice knowing that the person playing a queer characters has those experiences or connections to the actual community, and that whenever possible we should strive to have those people in those roles. I think this conversation is also missing the part of who’s writing the characters and their stories. Because even a gay actor in a poorly written gay role by a straight screenwriter can come off wrong.
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