Brian Damage
03-09-2008, 09:13 PM
The image is from the new Ben Stiller flick Tropical Thunder. Take a hard look and try to guess who's with Stiller in the picture above. The dude on the far left is Jack Black sporting bleached white hair. The dude in the middle is Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man) sporting the black face.
Yes, it's Downey doing his best C.Thomas Howell impersonation as an actor who wants a role so bad he's willing to get out the makeup kit and pretend to be black. YourMovieStuff.com has some more details on the flick:
"If you don’t recognize that African-American actor standing between Jack Black and Ben Stiller, there’s a good reason: He’s white. In Tropic Thunder, an epic action comedy co-written and directed by Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. plays Kirk Lazarus, a very serious Oscar-winning actor cast in the most expensive Vietnam war epic ever filmed. Problem is, Lazarus’s character, Sgt. Osiris, was originally written as black. So Lazarus decides to dye his skin and play Osiris, um, authentically. Funny? Sure. Dangerous? That’s an understatement. ”If it’s done right, it could be the type of role you called Peter Sellers to do 35 years ago,” Downey says. ”If you don’t do it right, we’re going to hell.”
Yes, it's Downey doing his best C.Thomas Howell impersonation as an actor who wants a role so bad he's willing to get out the makeup kit and pretend to be black. YourMovieStuff.com has some more details on the flick:
"If you don’t recognize that African-American actor standing between Jack Black and Ben Stiller, there’s a good reason: He’s white. In Tropic Thunder, an epic action comedy co-written and directed by Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. plays Kirk Lazarus, a very serious Oscar-winning actor cast in the most expensive Vietnam war epic ever filmed. Problem is, Lazarus’s character, Sgt. Osiris, was originally written as black. So Lazarus decides to dye his skin and play Osiris, um, authentically. Funny? Sure. Dangerous? That’s an understatement. ”If it’s done right, it could be the type of role you called Peter Sellers to do 35 years ago,” Downey says. ”If you don’t do it right, we’re going to hell.”