Shows/Movies where a race/gender/whatever swap actually worked

[martybegan]

With the current craze of re-casting certain roles without regards for the original race/sex/genderID/whatever of the source character, I wanted to start a thread on things like this that actually worked.

To me Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury works perfectly. I'm sure there are other examples out there.

 

[DGS49]

"An Officer and a Gentleman." As I have read it, the script called for a drill sergeant who was a southern redneck. Lew Gossett (not a southern redneck) read for the part and kicked ass. Film wouldn't have been as good without him.

 

[martybegan]

"An Officer and a Gentleman." As I have read it, the script called for a drill sergeant who was a southern redneck. Lew Gossett (not a southern redneck) read for the part and kicked ass. Film wouldn't have been as good without him.

James Greer in a Hunt for Red October was a Maine "Yankee" in the book, but James Earl Jones nailed the role in the movie.

 

[Harpy Eagle]

Ismael Córdova does a fantastic job as Arondir in the new LORT series on Prime.

Does that count?

 

[TNHarley]

Brokefront mountain

 

[Circe]

With the current craze of re-casting certain roles without regards for the original race/sex/genderID/whatever of the source character, I wanted to start a thread on things like this that actually worked.

To me Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury works perfectly. I'm sure there are other examples out there.

There was a Shakespeare play filming by that Kenneth Branaugh who is so awful nowadays about shoving blacks into completely unsuitable roles ---- but early on in his filming career he did a version of Much Ado About Nothing with himself and his wife the great Emma Thompson in the leading roles. Only one cast member was black, but that sort of worked --- because the two warring heirs to the dukedom were half brothers and the black one had a concubine mother. And it was (originally, even) set in Sicily, so that had a certain plausibility.

But in later stuff he went totally bonkers. His new and worthless Orient Express where he plays a blond Hercule Poirot [sigh] has every second character black and the whole plot is made nonsense thereby.

 

[Circe]

Get Out worked ----- though it wasn't exactly what you are talking about Marty Began -- I've seen it several times. Race is essential to the movie, but it is used in every way appropriately. I hope that director lives up to his first movie. His second was awful and I haven't seen his third, the new Nope. It's about blacks seeing flying saucers. He has a way of putting race in but that is not what the movie is about.

 

[lg325]

Women are running a western town. It is a fun movie. Jackie Coogan with hair sort of and playing a gunslinger it works he was fine actor.

 

[hjmick]

To me Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury works perfectly. I'm sure there are other examples out there.

When one considers that David Hasselhoff is the only other actor to have portrayed Nick Fury, and considering the fact that in 2002 Marvel's "Ultimate" specifically modeled their Nick Fury after Samuel L. Jackson... yeah, he's perfect in the role.

 

[petro]

Lost in Space...
The new Dr Smith is far more criminal than the original, even flushing someone out an airlock...

 

[braalian]

She’s only in the first episode, but making Joel’s daughter half-black in HBO’s “The Last of Us” works. The kids a good actor. (She was all-white in the video game)

And I wasn’t sure about making Death black in Netflix’s “Sandman”, but she was actually one of the few bright spots in that disappointedly boring show.

 

[Seymour Flops]

With the current craze of re-casting certain roles without regards for the original race/sex/genderID/whatever of the source character, I wanted to start a thread on things like this that actually worked.

To me Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury works perfectly. I'm sure there are other examples out there.

Never happened, but I always thought Will Smith as Robin would have worked great. He was the sidekick in MIB and it worked. Dagny Taggart's "sidekick" in Atlas Shrugged was played by a black guy in the movie. Worked OK, the character was happy to be second banana in the book, so it worked in the movie.

I don't know why Hollywood doesn't look for Hispanic and Asian actors to play "traditionally" white roles? Asians, especially. They are always the stereotypical brainiac, never some guy that barely gets by like average people.

 

[braalian]

Never happened, but I always thought Will Smith as Robin would have worked great. He was the sidekick in MIB and it worked. Dagny Taggart's "sidekick" in Atlas Shrugged was played by a black guy in the movie. Worked OK, the character was happy to be second banana in the book, so it worked in the movie.

I don't know why Hollywood doesn't look for Hispanic and Asian actors to play "traditionally" white roles? Asians, especially. They are always the stereotypical brainiac, never some guy that barely gets by like average people.

As many different Robins there was in the comics, I’m surprised there’s never been a black one

 

[Blaster]