What’s an Ethnic Actor To Do About Typecasting?

One of the big complaints I hear from ethnic actors is the problem of typecasting. A Latina actress friend of mine once told me about the problems she was having with a director. “He didn’t have to explicitly say it, but I knew that he wanted me to be that sassy, finger-snapping Latina with attitude,” she complained. “And I didn’t want to do it.”

As an actor of East Asian heritage, I have been well aware that East Asian men have historically been typecast as martial artists and gangsters, and are typically not romantically involved with anyone. East Asian women, on the other hand, are usually typecast as prostitutes or as the “hot” girlfriend of a Caucasian character. In the past few years though, roles for East Asian actors have become more varied to include professional characters such as doctors, lawyers, and scientists, but there is still a ways to go for the roles to truly reflect the full range of the East Asian experience.

Ethnic actors are often faced with the dilemma of being offered a role that makes them cringe because the role is such an ethnic stereotype. On the one hand, all actors want to work and to be able to express themselves artistically. On the other, accepting a role that caricatures based on race feels like moral principles are being compromised. What’s an ethnic actor to do?

Don’t Play into the Stereotype

As an actor, while there may not be anything I can do directly to prevent this typecasting, what I can do when I’m cast in a stereotypical East Asian role is to create a performance that actively pushes through the boundaries of the stereotype. For example, I was cast in a TV series as a manager of an East Asian brothel. My scenes involved a confrontation with two men; one was the owner of a rival brothel and the other was a police detective. Within the confines of the scripted scenes, I made the choice that my character would control the scene and not be bullied or intimidated by these two larger, more physically imposing men. I eventually got shot six times, but I’m proud that my character went down fighting as opposed to just being passive.

The thing to realize here, and this is true for all actors really, is that when playing a scripted role, an actor still has the choice to play the character either as a superficial caricature, or as a real multidimensional human being.

Get Behind the Camera and Take Control

Another thing I have the power to do as an actor is to start making my own films. I recently wrote, directed, produced, and acted in my own film Fate Scores, which so far has played at such venues as the Boston International Film Festival, the Wisconsin Film Festival, the Memphis International Film Festival, and the Asian American International Film Festival. I’m proud to say that ethnic minorities made up about half the cast.

Filmmaking can be such a powerful tool when it comes to changing people’s perceptions and the stereotypes they’re used to seeing from typical Hollywood fare. As an East Asian male actor in North America, instead of portraying a professional (like a lawyer, doctor, or accountant) or yet another gangster, I basically said to myself, “In this film, I want to be an indie rock musician and I want to get the girl in the end,” and I went out and did just that without having to explain myself to anyone.

Make Your Talent Transcend Ethnicity

Lastly, ethnic actors should strive to get cast in roles that are open to any ethnicity, thus avoiding typecasting altogether. The competition is obviously stiffer for ethnically open roles, but the kinds of roles can be more rewarding.

What’s important here is to get solid, reputable acting training. With all of the challenges imposed by the industry on ethnic actors, there’s no reason to let mediocre acting be an additional challenge. For the past few years, I’ve been taking a fantastic, ongoing scene study class. At some point, I realized that if I wanted to act in a role that was more than just the token one/two line ethnic character, I’d need some serious acting training. After all, acting is a highly skilled art that takes years, if not decades to master. I firmly believe that if an actor is both proactive and genuinely talented, then that actor will be noticed by the industry. And for ethnic actors, that means that they will not only be considered for specifically ethnic roles, but also for roles that are open to any ethnicity.

Tags: acting, casting, ethnic, Film, minority, race, stereotype, Television, typecasting