'But he's not gay!': The problem with authenticity in acting
Luca Johnson argues that freedom for actors is not only necessary for good art but essential for compassion.
In June last year one of the great actors of the past several decades, Tom Hanks, made a curious statement about his 1993 film, Philadelphia. Mr. Hanks pondered during an interview with The New York Times, “Could a straight man do what I did in Philadelphia now? No, and rightly so…We're beyond that now, and I don’t think people would accept the inauthenticity of a straight guy playing a gay guy.” These words were dismissed at the time as the usual ode to political correctness from the hive-minded cabal of Hollywood elites. But rather than dismissing these remarks on those grounds, let’s examine what Hanks’s appeal to ‘authenticity’ really means for acting and freedom more widely. After all, these concerns have perplexed finer philosophical minds than Tom Hanks.
In Book X of The Republic Plato outlines his moral gripes with the poets, actors and artists of his day. He asks us to “consider — when the painter makes his representation, does he do so by reference to the object as it actually is or to its superficial appearance? Is his representation one of an apparition or of the truth.” Postulating further, Plato says “a painter can paint a portrait of a carpenter…or any other craftsman without understanding any of their crafts; yet, if he is skillful enough, his portrait of a carpenter may, at a distance, deceive children or simple people into thinking it is a real carpenter.”
In Plato’s mind, what we see in a painting or on a stage can only ever be a hollow imitation of an original source. Like Plato, what Hanks is appealing to is a lack of truth. In not being gay himself, Hanks believes himself less capable of emulating a gay man’s life and mind, giving a more diluted and therefore inaccurate portrayal than a gay actor would — this is on a charitable reading. Realistically, he means that it has become morally objectionable for an actor who doesn’t have a particular characteristic to play a part where they do have that characteristic. What one might call a simulation of another’s ‘lived experience’. Trouble is, that’s a pretty good definition of acting.
But what is acting in a world where the subjective is gospel and no one’s truth must be discounted, manipulated or interfered with? Where Hanks and Plato (which sounds like a wonderful sketch if anyone wishes to write it) differ, is in the fact that Plato would have found just as much grievance in Hanks’s portrayal as a soldier, a prison guard and a container ship captain, seeing as these too are but apparitions of professions that Hanks has never really had. Nor, dare I suggest, does he have much real understanding of life as a toy cowboy. In view of this, although Hanks’s appeal to his Philadelphia performance’s lack of authenticity is not without merit, any merit it possessed is rendered nebulous from the rather arbitrary line he draws at sexuality, which is clearly a product of the zeitgeist we are currently wrestling with in our times. What truly separates Plato and Hanks, other than time, is consistency.
Plato is stating the simple truth that art holds up a mirror to reality. Of course, art cannot be as truthful as its first-hand source; however, he and Hanks fundamentally miss the mark with respect to the function of acting and art. Having a small measure of first-hand experience in the field of acting, I would humbly suggest that to be an actor (if one takes its requirements seriously) is to open oneself up to an exploration of what makes humans actually human. To engage seriously with the ultimate range of human experience and to interrogate why characters make the choices they make and why they feel what they feel.
Plato’s cynicism towards the arts as a distortion of truth leads to a society that would be rather too self-interested — you could say this is where we are just now. It would discourage us from considering the lives of others; to not stimulate our minds and ask: “How on Earth did that pilot land that plane on the Hudson? What must that have felt like?” What Plato is suggesting from a philosophical standpoint — and Hanks from a warped political standpoint — is that certain people should stay in their lane. Where Plato has a problem with art being merely mimetic, Hanks thinks this mimesis is the problem. For Plato the imitation is hollow, for Hanks it’s egregious.
But Hanks and all the other actors captured by an over-zealous respect for progressive ‘authenticity’ tie themselves in knots here; they have to condemn their own craft. Due to never having all the attributes of the characters they are playing, they are automatically disrespecting anyone out there in the world with those characteristics. The reverence for ‘lived experience’ results in absurdity.
I am inclined to believe that Tom Hanks is a more pensive, compassionate and experienced man for playing a role further from his natural self, such as one with a different sexuality. Indeed, taking a performance seriously is the real mark of respect for others’ lived experiences. The freedom actors have had historically to play characters with whom they share very little is now being slowly eroded by identitarian politics that reduces people to their immutable characteristics and keeps us closed off from each other.
If we in Britain are to create a more cohesive society, I suggest we stop drawing these arbitrary lines around who is allowed to play what part based on an adherence to identity politics. Art has every bit as much capacity for discovering ‘truth’ or authenticity as Plato’s narrow conception of the word. Acting in particular can be a great vehicle for social compassion and progress. Allowing other people to explore the internal lives of others without reservation or political prejudice is not only necessary for good art — it is essential for understanding one another.
Luca Johnson is an actor and writer based in London.
Great piece!