In an extraordinary turn of events over the weekend, actor Ed Skrein took to Twitter to announce that he had departed the upcoming Hellboy reboot, where he had been cast as Major Ben Daimio a week or two ago, due to the controversy surrounding his casting.
The role, which is from the Dark Horses comics, is of Mixed Asian heritage and Skrein has said he was “unaware” of the background of the character and as such has announced his leaving the project. He said: “It is clear that representing this chracter in a culturally accurate way holds significance for people and that to neglect this reponsibility would continue a worrying tendency to obscure ethnic monority stories and voices in the Arts.”
The full statement from Skrein’s Twitter page can be read below:
It’s not the first time such controversy has been heard of in Hollywood – just last year there was controversy surrounding the casting of Scarlett Johansson in the lead role of Major int he Hollywood remake of Ghost in the Shell; and, over the years, there have been many other instances, possibly most ntably Mickey Rooney’s performance in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.
Skrein must be commended for his actions and could set a precedent for future productions. In a statement to Deadline, producers Larry Gordon and Lloyd Levin, of Lionsgate and Millennium said: “Ed came to us and felt very strongly about this. We fully support his unselfish decision. It was not our intent to be insensitive to issues of authenticity and ethnicity, and we will look to recast the part with an actor more consistent with the character in the source material.”
This Hellboy is the start of a brand-new series of films, with the first directed by Game of Thrones and The Descent helmer Neil Marshall. David Harbour (Stranger Things) is stepping into the lead role, taking over from Ron Perlman from the previous two films, with Ian McShane (John Wick 2) and Milla Jovovich (Resident Evil) also on-board with Jovovich set to take on villain duties as The Blood Queen.
The film has no release date yet but could be released either at the end of next year or during 2019.
