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Ben Stiller Doubts ‘Tropic Thunder’ Could Get Made Today: Robert Downey Jr. in Blackface Is ‘Incredibly Dicey’ and ‘Edgier Comedy Is Harder to Do’ Now

Ben Stiller doubts "Tropic Thunder" could get made today because "edgier comedy is harder to do" now and Robert Downey Jr. in Blackface is "dicey."

Downey starred in “Tropic Thunder” as Kirk Lazarus, an Australian thespian who takes Method acting to an unethical extreme by donning Blackface (or undergoing “pigmentation alteration” surgery, as he puts it) to play a Black soldier in the Vietnam movie. During an appearance on Rob Lowe’s “Literally!” podcast earlier this year, Downey drew a line between “Tropic Thunder” and Norman Lear’s iconic sitcom “All in the Family.” He said both works shine a light on “tropes that are not right and had been perpetuated for too long” and faced criticism from those who weren’t seeing the bigger picture. “The spirit that [Ben] Stiller directed and cast and shot ‘Tropic Thunder’ in was, essentially, as a railing against all of these tropes that are not right and [that] had been perpetuated for too long.”

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