Bryan Cranston says he and Kevin Hart are making a sequel to THE UPSIDE even though he ‘got a lot of shit’ for playing a disabled man

Comedy drama of 2017 Bright side was a film based on a true story in which a billionaire (played by an Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning actor Bryan Cranston) becomes quadriplegic in a paragliding accident, and despite the urgings of his personal assistant (Nicole Kidman), hires an ex-con (Kevin Hart) to become his daily helper. Besides being a true story, the film is also a remake of the French film The Untouchables, which was a really great movie. So this had a lot to live up to.

Bright side it was good, although not as good as the original in my opinion. It told a great story and gave solid performances to everyone on screen, especially its leads. But the film’s star, Bryan Cranston, didn’t walk away from playing the part unscathed.

Over the past decade or so, we’ve seen many actors and filmmakers held to account for inappropriate roles and inappropriate roles, such as white actors playing people of color, or even straight and cisgender people playing members of the queer community. . The problem with this is that often people of color and people in minority communities aren’t hired for jobs as readily as their white, straight, cis, and heteronormative counterparts. So the people who live the lives portrayed in the movies aren’t even hired to portray their own stories, and that’s frustrating. And that’s what was underlined when Cranston played the part of a man with quadriplegia. There are a lot of disabled people who don’t get cast for roles in the mainstream, so it must be hard to see an able man win over someone who really struggled with being disabled in some way.

Despite that, Cranston says they’re actually making a sequel to the film. In a recent interview on Bill Maher’s Random club podcast, Cranston said, “We’re doing a sequel,” but went on to say that he “took shit” for playing a quadriplegic in the film.

“I have a lot of shit for this. I’m a skilled actor playing a disabled actor.

Maher replied:

“I mean, it’s called acting. It’s almost the point, that you’re doing something you’re not, right?

Cranston continued:

“I was quite surprised that there was some backlash, and I thought, ‘There’s a good point, that disabled actors aren’t given a chance.’ It’s kind of a 22 problem that…it’s like, ‘Do you have the cache to be able to carry a movie?’”

The breaking Bad went on to cite able-bodied actors who have been praised for playing characters with disabilities, such as Al Pacino (who played a blind retired army officer in Perfume of woman) and Daniel Day-Lewis (who played a man with cerebral palsy in My left foot), saying that “we would have missed out on some great performances” if those actors hadn’t played their characters.

However, Cranston added:

“You can only have the perspective of a 66-year-old white male… you can understand but you can’t really know what it feels like to live in that skin.”

I see both sides of it. It would certainly be appropriate for someone who is disabled to play a role like this, but are there so many paraplegic actors looking for roles? And as Maher said, it’s kind of all about acting, people learn as much as they can to play someone else in the world and tell their story. It’s complicated. But we will keep you posted on the next sequel.

The full interview with Maher and Cranston will be released on Monday.

via: variety