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Why foreigners play American superheroes and that's (mostly) fine
Even with performers like Evans and Affleck, the sheer amount of non-American actors playing traditionally very American superheroes is high. Why?
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Batman (Ben Affleck, left) face to face with Superman (Henry Cavill, right) in (Warner Bros./-)
C
omic books are about as American as apple pie, so why is it that when said comic books get converted to the big screen, non-American actors snatch up the biggest roles?
There’s the Welsh Christian Bale as Batman, the Australian Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, the British Henry Cavill, Benedict Cumberbatch, Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland as Superman, Dr. Stephen Strange, Spider-Man and Spider-Man yet again, respectively. There’s even Canadian Ryan Reynolds as the Green Lantern and Deadpool.
This isn’t only a trend on the big screen, either. Only two out of the four actors behind the Defenders – Marvel’s collection of interconnected Netflix shows – are American: Mike Colter and Kristen Ritter, who play the titular character in Luke Cage and Jessica Jones, respectively.
Boston-born Chris Evans serves as one of the only outliers, but only because the casting team insisted that Steve Rogers, better known as Captain America, be played by an actual American. Evans was even reluctant to take the role, figuring that the eight films outlined in his contract were too great of a commitment.
Ben Affleck, DC’s newest Batman, was seen as the American actor’s return to form. Yet, the British Henry Cavill was his counterpart in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice as Superman, who stands for “truth, justice, and the American way.”
Even with performers like Evans and Affleck, the sheer amount of non-American actors playing traditionally very American superheroes is high. Why?
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John Papsidera, the casting director on both The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, told Vulture his reasoning back in 2011.
"You look at the list of American leading men, and in their twenties and thirties, they're very boy-like. Take Jesse Eisenberg: I put him in Zombieland, but he's not going to play Superman. He's much closer to what Dustin Hoffman turned into than John Wayne or Steve McQueen,” he said.
“It's hard to find movie stars that live up to the needs of the story. Leo [DiCaprio] is growing into it, but for a long time, he seemed young and boy-like. Inception was the first time Leo seemed to have fully grown into a man. You need to find guys who carry that heroic-ness with them.”
In essence, some believe that American men are no longer “manly enough”.
But if a comedic actor like Chris Pratt can go from the goofy Andy on Parks and Recreation to heroic Peter Quill in Guardians of the Galaxy, like his job as an actor requires him to do, that cannot be the only reason.
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Some think that instead, it’s the difference in acting and training styles between the countries.
“In Britain, they take their training seriously, while in the States we’re going through a sort of social media image conscious thing rather than formal training. Many actors are getting caught up in this image thing [that] is going on to affect their range,” said actor Michael Douglas.
It’s fair to say that while a lot of comic book movies are still seen as juvenile and mindless, they require actors with a very specific understanding of the character to be truly effective. So, if an actor does have the training and more importantly, the understanding, why shouldn’t they be able to play an American character?
For the most part, it’s the understanding that is key. Certain characters require specific experiences to be portrayed honestly. If there were to be a Young Avengers movie made, and they needed an America Chavez, the actress portraying the young superhero would likely have to be US-born Latina to effectively understand the nuances of being a Latina-American.
But when characters don’t require that sort of background, why shouldn’t they go to an actor with better training and an even better understanding of the character, even if they aren’t American?
A hero can be anyone, according to Batman, even if they were born in the United Kingdom. (kes)
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