It's a Sin

[Jellybean]

Members may be interested in viewing the trailer of It’s a Sin, the forthcoming UK Channel 4 drama set during the 1980s AIDS epidemic. Also included below is a preview of an article to be published in the RadioTimes about the TV show, its writer Russell T Davies (he also wrote Queer as Folk – see clip below) and casting gay actors as gay characters.

Russell T Davies speaks out on the importance of casting gay actors as gay characters in It’s a Sin

"You wouldn’t cast someone able-bodied and put them in a wheelchair."

By Flora Carr
Monday, 11th January 2021 at 9:00 pm

It’s A Sin creator Russell T Davies has stressed the importance of casting gay actors in the roles of the gay male characters.

The Channel 4 series, starring the likes of Olly Alexander, Neil Patrick Harris, and Stephen Fry, is set during the 1980s AIDS epidemic and follows a group of young gay men who move to London.

Speaking exclusively to Radio Times, Davies said he thinks “authenticity” is a critical component when it comes to casting a TV show like It’s A Sin . . .

Source: RadioTimes

[francois]

Casting gay actors as gays, is a double standard. Many gays have portrayed straight guys for years and no problems. Think Rock Hudson.

[latintopxxx]

....very tricky this...be very cafeful what u wish for...like only white people can be cast in plays that originally had white casts like most of shakespeare...

[StevieWonders]

Davies seems to be espousing the current fad which started with the notion that only a “trans” actor can play a “trans” person. Presumably that means only the sub-class of “trans” who’ve had their cock cut off can play former males, and only those who’ve had a cock implant can play former females. It then moved on to condemn those hundreds of actors who over the years have “blacked up” to play Othello, since the role of a black person can only be played by a black person.

Latterly there have been “colour blind” period dramas featuring black people playing white characters - the maid in the 2017 adaptation of Howard’s End, for example, which underlines the hypocrisy of the “only blacks can play blacks” mantra.

Turning Francois’ comment around - should a straight actor be allowed to play a gay character? Isn’t the whole point of acting to represent someone you are not in a wholly convincing way?

As for “trans”: I’ve often said to a (female) family member whose teenage daughter has decided she’s “trans” and now “identifies as” a male, all it proves is what I’ve said all along - the male gender is both preferable and superior.

[Jellybean]

On July 4, 1982 Terry Higgins was among the first people in the UK known to die of an AIDS related illness - leading to the establishment of the Terrence Higgins Trust. I arrived in London in November 1982, and in 1983, one of my lodgers volunteered to work for the newly set up Terrence Higgins Trust and, in those early years, much of what I learned of this new deadly disease I learnt from him.

The following further It's a Sin teaser trailers brings back many memories, some happy as I recall the excitement I felt at starting my new work and gay life in London and some unhappy, as I think back on the friends who didn’t make it.



And not wanting to end this post on a down beat note, I have included the song, It’s a Sin one of my favourite Pet Shop Boys songs . . .

[StevieWonders]

There’s a great line in this week’s Spectator: “chip away at the horrible straight white hegemony under which oppressed people like the millionaire Russel T Davies OBE live their undoubtedly difficult lives”. The whole piece (“Who wants to be lectured by children?”) is worthwhile reading.

[arsenal]

I consider Russel T Davies to be something of a modern day Shakespeare such is the depth and quality of his writing. His work includes QaF, A very English Scandal, Doctor Who and the brilliant Years and Years. So I will forgive him this blip of nonsense with regards to which actors can play which roles. Under this idea Gandalf and Dumbledore aka Sir Ian and Sir Michael need to swap roles and remake 12 movies. Also we don't get the stunning Charlie Hunnam frolicking naked on the bed or Rupert Graves naked in Maurice.

So Russel, it's like this. Over the last 30 years or so we've managed to acquire for ourselves the same age of consent, marriage, adoption, extra protection against hate crime, no work place discrimination, seats in government, the highest paid entertainer at the BBC and even a Prime Minister. So we don't need this patronising nonsense thank you.

[StevieWonders]

I consider Russel T Davies to be something of a modern day Shakespeare such is the depth and quality of his writing. His work includes QaF, A very English Scandal, Doctor Who and the brilliant Years and Years.

There we must disagree. Tom Stoppard is by far the better dramatist. As far as I’m aware Davies has not written much - if anything - for the stage.

[arsenal]

a, not the

[StevieWonders]

a, not the

In comparing two known alternatives, standard English grammar dictates using the definite rather than the indefinite article.