Expert pushes back on controversy in upcoming Bernstein biopic
LAWRENCE – Having seen a preview of Bradley Cooper’s biopic of 20th century composer/conductor Leonard Bernstein that is already generating controversy over the actor’s prosthetic nose, Henry Bial allows that “the nose is unfortunate,” but he does not agree with those criticizing it.
Bial, University of Kansas professor of theatre, is the author of “Acting Jewish: Negotiating Ethnicity on the American Stage and Screen” (University of Michigan Press). He is available to journalists covering the new film to comment upon it.
“You're entitled to your opinion about whether you think Bradley Cooper should or shouldn't play Bernstein, and you can be really disappointed in the choice to wear a prosthetic nose for a lot of historical reasons. But it's still not really 'Jewface' in the way that Al Jolson did blackface,” he said.
Bial said the reactions against Cooper’s Bernstein portrayal are an outgrowth of other ethno-dramatic controversies in recent years.
“It's only in the last five or 10 years, perhaps, that audiences have come to expect consonance between the identity position of the actor and the identity position of the character that they play,” he said. “When Tom Hanks did the movie ‘Philadelphia,’ nobody cared that he wasn't gay, but that can't happen now.
“The culture has changed to where we're no longer comfortable with these kinds of high-profile gay roles going to straight actors. Similarly, when Natalie Wood played Maria in ‘West Side Story,’ that could not happen today. And if it did, people would be legitimately upset. So what's happening is that a subset — not all Jewish actors, but a subset of Jews in the industry — are starting to say, ‘Hey, wait a minute. If it’s no longer OK for me to play Bernardo in ‘West Side Story,’ why is it OK for Alfred Molina to play Tevye in ‘Fiddler on the Roof?’”
Bial says there are “three different arguments in play, and everyone mixes them up strategically, depending on what they think will win their argument.
“There is an authenticity argument that says: If you have not had the experience of being Jewish in America, you cannot possibly represent it on stage or screen as authentically as someone who has.
“As a theatre education professional, I can tell you that if you lined up to 10 acting teachers ... seven of them would say, ‘No, our whole acting method is based around the idea that if you feel like an outsider because you were the only kid in your dorm room who grew up on a farm, you can, in fact — through the magic of emotional substitution — use that and authentically represent a character who feels like an outsider because they're Jewish. As long as you do the homework. As long as you do the dialect work. As long as you really do the research.’
“But then there's an opportunity argument, which basically says that when you have people who have been denied opportunities for years because of who they are — If you've been told, ‘No, I'm sorry, we can't cast you in "King Lear" or "A Doll's House" because you're too Jewish' — then when a part comes along that's incontrovertibly Jewish, and they get someone who isn't, it's just insulting.
“And then there is a respect argument, which says, ‘Will the person not only do it inauthentically but do it so inauthentically that it will actually be bad for the Jews? Will they represent us in a way that we would not ever represent ourselves?’ And that goes back to the first question, which is, ‘Did you do the homework? Are you doing this in good faith? Or are you doing this in a way that is intentionally dehumanizing?’”
To interview Bial, contact Rick Hellman, public affairs officer, at rick_hellman@ku.edu.