Posted by peter Willis on November 29, 2010 at 12:43:11 user PeterWillis.
In Reply to: Re: SA Theatre Production posted by Mike Dennis on November 28, 2010 at 22:55:44:
There is as Pam says, colour-blind casting, which can work. I not long ago saw Adrian Lester as Prince Hal in Henry IV pt 1. Maginficent, and his skin ceased to make any difference within a few minutes or less as far as I was concerned.
Then there's what I suppose you'd call colour-specific casting, eg black actor for Othello, and as you say slaves in UTC. Important if race is an issue within the production (or I suppose you could go a bit mad and switch everyone around to make some sort of point).
And then there's I suppose something between the two, where you cast black actors fairly randomly, but with a modicum of contextual guidance. Thus casting the... er... Blacketts (!! :-)) with black actors would give an additional emphasis or dimension. But casting one of four siblings with an actor demonstrably racially distinct from the other three merely gives rise to irrelevant and rather regrettable speculation as to what Mother might get up to while Cdr Walker (or whatever rank he might have been at the time) was overseas.