Javier Bardem Scoffs at Critics Aghast at Him Being Spanish and Playing Cuban Desi Arnaz

Spanish-born actor Javier Bardem scoffed at critics who question him for playing Cuba-born TV icon Desi Arnaz in the upcoming Aaron Sorkin biopic, Being the Ricardos, following the life of Lucille Ball.

Bardem was cast to play Arnaz, long-time husband to star Lucille Ball, in the film starring Nicole Kidman as Ball. But some wonder why an actor from Spain was picked to play a Cuban.

As far as Bardem is concerned, the question makes no sense.

“I’m an actor, and that’s what I do for a living: try to be people that I’m not,” Javier told The Hollywood Reporter.

He also claimed that these questions are usually thrown at actors who are non-native English speakers, and added that American or British actors can put on all sorts of accents without being criticized.

“What do we do with Marlon Brando playing Vito Corleone? What do we do with Margaret Thatcher played by Meryl Streep? Daniel Day-Lewis playing Lincoln? Why does this conversation happen with people with accents?” Bardem asked.

“You have your accent. That’s where you belong,” he said of critics who try to pigeonhole actors. “That’s tricky. Where is that conversation with English-speaking people doing things like The Last Duel, where they were supposed to be French people in the Middle Ages? That’s fine. But me, with my Spanish accent, being Cuban?”

“What I mean is,” he continued, “if we want to open the can of worms, let’s open it for everyone. The role came to me, and one thing that I know for sure is that I’m going to give everything that I have.”

“We should all start not allowing anybody to play Hamlet unless they were born in Denmark,” he added.

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Bardem seemed to have some misgivings about how he approached the question, though, as the Reporter added that after the interview, Bardem sent an email with more on the topic.

“I do recognize that there are many underrepresented voices and stories that need to be told, and we should collectively do better to provide access and opportunities for more American Latino stories and storytellers,” he said in the email, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Still, Bardem was not the only one to find criticism over the film for his nationality. Star Nicole Kidman, who is Australian, was also blasted for taking the role of American icon Lucille Ball. The criticism of the actors was so insistent that both Bardem and Kidman briefly tried to extricate themselves from the production. Producer Todd Black, though, reportedly convinced them to stay on.

The film’s writer and director, Aaron Sorkin, also hit back at critics attacking the film for casting a Spaniard as a Cuban and an Australian as an American. Sorkin noted that pinning actors solely to their genetics, sexual proclivity, or ethnicity is foolishness.

“Having an actor who was born in Spain playing a character who was born in Cuba was not demeaning. And it wasn’t just the casting consultant who agreed, Lucy and Desi’s Cuban American daughter didn’t have a problem with it. So, I’m very comfortable with it,” he said last month of casting Bardem.

“So, Javier is Spanish, and the casting consultant was fine with it. But I don’t want to use the casting consultant as cover,” the Oscar-winning writer-director continued.

“I want to tell you my opinion on this and I stand by it, which is this: Spanish and Cuban aren’t actable, okay? They’re not actable. By the way, neither are straight and gay. Because I know there’s a small movement underway that only gay actors should play gay characters. Gay and straight aren’t actable. You could act being attracted to someone, but most nouns aren’t actable,” he concluded.

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