11 A-List Actors Who Were Cast in the Wrong Movie Roles

When Robert Downey Jr. was cast as the title character in Iron Man, it was considered to be one of the best bits of casting ever, and it still is. But now Downey Jr. is returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as another character, Doctor Doom, and many people don’t think he’s the right actor for the part.




One reason Downey Jr.’s casting as Doctor Doom is controversial is the fact the character is Romani in the comics, and the actor is not. Unfortunately, casting an actor who is the wrong race or wrong gender identity happens quite a lot in Hollywood. It’s usually done for capitalistic reasons, with the assumption that certain actors “sell” better than others. It happens less now, but as the Robert Downey Jr. example shows, it still happens.


11 John Wayne Was Egregiously Miscast as Genghis Khan

John Wayne as Genghis Khan in The Conqueror

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Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

The Conqueror

n/a

3.7

One of the most famous examples of cinematic whitewashing is the casting of John Wayne as Genghis Khan in The Conqueror. Genghis Khan was a Mongol, and Wayne most decidedly was not. In the few reviews that exist, film critics thought that casting Wayne was a ridiculous notion, and completely panned the movie.

There was seemingly no question at any point of actually casting a Mongolian actor to play Khan, because before Wayne took the role, Marlon Brando was offered it. Brando wisely said no, and thus avoided playing a pivotal role in what’s considered one of the worst films of all time.


10 Eddie Redmayne Regretted Playing Lili Elbe

Lili (Eddie Redmayne) looks concerned in The Danish Girl.

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

The Danish Girl

66%

7.1

In 2015, Eddie Redmayne played Lili Elbe, a trans woman who was one of the first people ever to receive gender-affirming surgery in The Danish Girl. At the time, many people pointed out that the role would have been better played by someone who was themselves a trans woman, and the dislike of Redmayne’s casting only increased over time.


Redmayne himself ended up deciding that he probably shouldn’t have taken the role. He told The Sunday Times newspaper in 2021, “I made that film with the best intentions, but I think it was a mistake.” He also added that, “many people don’t have a chair at the table” and he would not accept any more trans roles.

Alicia Vikander as Gerda Wegener and Eddie Redmayne as Lili Elbe are on the cover of The Danish Girl.

The Danish Girl

A fictitious love story loosely inspired by the lives of Danish artists Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. Lili and Gerda’s marriage and work evolve as they navigate Lili’s groundbreaking journey as a transgender pioneer.

Director
Tom Hooper

Release Date
January 22, 2016

Cast
Eddie Redmayne , Alicia Vikander

Runtime
1 hour 59 minutes

9 Johnny Depp Insisted He Should Play Tonto

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

The Lone Ranger

31%

6.4


The Lone Ranger starred Armie Hammer as the title character and Johnny Depp as his famous Native sidekick, Tonto. The only problem was, Johnny Depp was not Native. He insisted at the time that he did actually have Native heritage, and wanted to “right the wrongs of the past” with his casting, according to Indian Country Today Media Network.

The Native community has since debunked Depp’s claims by pointing out he is non-Native, with Sonny Skyhawlk and Angela Aleiss elaborating on the harm white actors cause when they claim Native ancestry where none exists. Given that, Depp is generally considered a very poor choice to play Tonto. Coupled with Armie Hammer’s fall from grace, and the fact that the movie was a massive bomb, Depp will never play him again.

The Lone Ranger

The Lone Ranger

Native American warrior Tonto recounts the untold tales that transformed John Reid, a man of the law, into a legend of justice.


8 Scarlett Johansson Received Backlash for Playing Motoko Kusanagi

Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell

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Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Ghost in the Shell

42%

6.3

Fans of Ghost in the Shell were shocked when Scarlett Johansson was cast as main character Motoko Kusanagi in the Hollywood adaption of the manga. Given that Johansson is not Japanese, it led to a lot of discussion about whitewashing and race discrimination, even if Japanese citizens were okay with the casting.


Despite the director of the original anime, Mamoru Oshii, coming out and saying he had no problem with the casting, Ghost in the Shell was still criticized for whitewashing. In fact, the film is still held up as an example of Hollywood whitewashing, with Asian actor Sandra Oh even making a joke about it at the 2019 Golden Globes.

7 Rooney Mara Felt Terrible About Pan

Rooney Mara as Tiger Lily in Pan

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Pan

26%

5.7


Rooney Mara played Tiger Lily, a famous Native character, in the Peter Pan-inspired Pan. People were very upset about the casting that they started a petition to get Mara removed from the role, but it didn’t work. Pan director Joe Wright defended her, saying that everyone would “get it” once they saw the film, but they didn’t.

Eventually, once the fury had died down, Mara herself spoke about her regret at taking the role. “I really hate, hate, hate that I am on that side of the whitewashing conversation. I really do,” she told the Telegraph in 2016. I don’t ever want to be on that side of it again. I can understand why people were upset and frustrated.”

pan-poster-levi-miller.jpg

Pan

An imaginative prequel to the original story of Peter Pan and Wendy from J.M. Barrie’s original works, Pan is an adventure fantasy film that follows Peter Pan from his origins to his first major battle against the infamous Captain James Hook. The film stars the young Levi Miller as Peter, with Hook being portrayed by Hugh Jackman.

6 Jake Gyllenhaal Didn’t Look Like a Prince of Persia

Prince of Persia The Sands of Time movie


Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Prince of Persia

36%

6.6

In video game adaptionPrince of Persia: The Sands of Time, main character Dastan was played by white actor Jake Gyllenhaal. Although the wider debate about whitewashing had yet to really take off back in 2010, there were still a lot of people who thought the Prince of Persia should have rightly been Iranian.

The film was a box office bomb and critical disaster, and later Gyllenhaal seemed to indicate that he agreed with the whitewashing criticisms, telling Yahoo! Entertainment, “I think I learned a lot from that movie in that I spend a lot of time trying to be very thoughtful about the roles that I pick and why I’m picking them.”


prince-of-persia_-the-sands-of-time-poster-jake-gyllenhaal-as-a-persian-with-blades.jpg

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is an action-adventure film directed by Mike Newell. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as Dastan, a rogue prince who joins forces with Princess Tamina, played by Gemma Arterton, to prevent a villain from unleashing a sandstorm that could destroy the world. Utilizing a mystical dagger that can reverse time, Dastan faces numerous challenges as he seeks to safeguard this powerful relic.

5 Tilda Swinton’s Ancient One Was Very Different From the Comics

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Benedict Cumberbatch Confirms Return as Doctor Strange in Avengers 5

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Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Doctor Strange

89%

7.5


When Tilda Swinton was cast as the Ancient One in Doctor Strange, eyebrows were immediately raised. In the Marvel Comics, the Ancient One was an Asian man, but in the movie he was suddenly a white woman. Fans weren’t happy, and they were even less happy when Kevin Feige tried to justify the decision by saying an Asian mentor figure would be “stereotypical.”

In the end, Feige regretted casting Swinton. He told Men’s Health in 2021 that actually, he could have simply cast an Asian man and avoided clichés in the script, ensuring the character wouldn’t be the stereotype he feared he would be. But by that point, of course, it was too late.


4 The Real Tony Mendez Wasn’t Much Like Ben Affleck

Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Argo

96%

7.7

In Argo Ben Affleck played Tony Mendez, a CIA operative in the midst of the Iran Hostage Crisis. The film was based on a book by the real Tony Mendez, but the man himself was Mexican-American, and Affleck is white. While reportedly the real Mendez didn’t have an issue with Affleck playing him, other people weren’t impressed.

Film producer Moctesuma Esparza wrote for The Guardian that Mendez’s “ethnicity is stolen from the Latino community at a time when Latinos have been demonized.” The whitewashing drew a lot of commentary at the time, and there were also debates about the movie’s historical accuracy in general.


Argo Movie Poster

Argo

Argo is a historical thriller adapted from the memoir of CIA operative Tony Mendez. The film follows Mendez as he infiltrates Tehran, Iran, by pretending to be filming a sci-fi movie during the Iran hostage crisis at the beginning of the 1980s. Ben Affleck stars as Mendez as he infiltrates to save the six escaped embassy staff members.

3 Benedict Cumberbatch Was a Very Different Khan

Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan in Star Trek

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Star Trek: Into Darkness

84%

7.7

The original Khan in Star Trek was played by Ricardo Montalban, who was Mexican but playing an Indian. That wasn’t great, but somehow Star Trek: Into Darkness managed to take a step even further backwards. In that movie, Khan was played by white British actor Benedict Cumberbatch.


Because the true identity of Cumberbatch’s character wasn’t revealed until the film actually came out, the casting choice slipped under the radar to some degree. When the movie debuted, there was plenty of criticism on social media, but nothing could be done about it until Star Trek: Strange New Worlds came out.

2 Tom Hardy Wasn’t a Comics-Accurate Bane


3:14

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10 Real World Inspirations Behind Batman’s Villains

Batman’s most iconic villains like Ra’s al Ghul, Catwoman and Clayface all took inspiration from incredible pieces of literature to classic Hollywood.

Movie

RT Score

The Dark Knight Rises IMDb Score

The Dark Knight Rises

87%

8.4

Bane is one of Batman’s most formidable villains, but he’s yet to have a truly accurate movie portrayal. While Tom Hardy’s performance in The Dark Knight Rises garnered praise for its grittiness, his take on the character was still whitewashed.

Bane is supposed to be Latino, but Tom Hardy is a white British actor, and that wasn’t even the only problem with whitewashing in the Christopher Nolan Batman films. R’as al Ghul and his daughter Talia are Middle Eastern, with the latter also having East Asian ancestry. Yet, they were played in the trilogy by white actors Liam Neeson and Marion Cotillard, respectively.


1 Zoë Saldaña Got Slated For Her Turn As Nina Simone

Zoe Saldana as Nina Simone in Nina

Movie

Rotten Tomatoes Score

IMDb Score

Nina

2%

5.4

Few casting choices have been as controversial as Zoë Saldaña’s Nina Simone. Saldaña’s skin was not the same shade as Simone’s, and she had to wear a false nose in order to look anything like her. Simone’s own daughter came out and said Saldaña should not play the role. Seemingly, absolutely nobody was in favor.


In the end, Zoë Saldaña had extreme regrets about taking the role in Nina. According to Deadline, She cried while telling Pose creator Steven Canals on Instagram, “I should have never played Nina. I’m so sorry. I know better today and I’m never going to do that again.” The biopic itself was a complete critical disaster.

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