Film & TV1 min(s) read
Published 17:03 07 Jul 2020 GMT
Hollywood actress Halle Berry has announced that she is to pull out of an upcoming film in which she was to play a transgender character, after facing considerable backlash online.
Per Variety, Berry revealed during an Instagram live video that she had been preparing for the role but had not yet been officially cast as the character.
“[It’s] a character where the woman is a trans character, so she’s a woman that transitioned into a man. She’s a character in a project I love that I might be doing,” she said.
The actress added that she wanted to take a "deep dive" into "that world", Variety reports, likely meaning the trans community. “Who this woman was is so interesting to me, and that will probably be my next project,” Berry continued.
However, she has since received backlash on social media, after misgendering the character multiple times. One Twitter user wrote of her discussions of the character, "please reconsider @halleberry. trans men aren’t women playing dress up, and this would do a lot more harm than good."
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Another added, "Halle Berry on playing a trans man in her next movie: “It's really important to me to tell stories, and that’s a woman, that’s a female story – it changes to a man, but I want to understand the why and how of that. I want to get into it.” Cis actors need to stop doing this."
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Since then, Halle Berry has released a statement in which she confirmed that she would no longer be considering the role and apologized for her remarks. She wrote;
“Over the weekend I had the opportunity to discuss my consideration of an upcoming role as a transgender man, and I’d like to apologize for those remarks. As a cisgender woman, I now understand that I should not have considered this role, and that the transgender community should undeniably have the opportunity to tell their own stories.
“I am grateful for the guidance and critical conversation over the past few days and will continue to listen, educate and learn from this mistake. I vow to be an ally in using my voice to promote better representation on-screen, both in front of and behind the camera.”
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GLAAD responded to Berry's statement on Twitter, writing, "We are pleased that @halleberry listened to the concerns of transgender people and learned from them. Other powerful people should do the same. A good place to start is by watching @Disclosure_Doc to learn about trans representation in media."
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