Harewood, who plays CIA director in Homeland, says UK actors may be able to more easily ‘unshackle ourselves from the burden of racial realities’

The Homeland actor David Harewood has stepped into the controversy over black British actors playing African American roles, arguing that Britons may be better suited to some parts because they are not burdened by “what’s in the history books”.



In an article for the Guardian, Birmingham-born Harewood writes that it is perhaps because they are not “real American brothers” that he and other black British performers are able “to unshackle ourselves from the burden of racial realities – and simply play what’s on the page”.

He was responding to remarks by the American actor Samuel L Jackson, who suggested to a radio station last week that the role played by Londoner Daniel Kaluuya in the horror film Get Out, which centres on an interracial relationship, might have been portrayed more authentically by an African American.

“I tend to wonder what that movie would have been with an American brother who really feels that,” Jackson told the New York station Hot 97.1. “Daniel grew up in a country where they’ve been interracial dating for 100 years. What would a brother from America have made of that role? Some things are universal but [not everything is].”

Jackson also suggested that so many British actors were cast in American roles because “they’re cheaper than us, for one thing”, and because casting agents thought Britons were better trained.

But Harewood scoffs at the idea that the motivation was financial: “The idea that American producers and directors are choosing black British talent to save themselves a buck or two is ridiculous – it’s because we’re damn good.”

Having worked “extremely hard” in the US for several years, writes Harewood – notably playing the CIA director David Estes in Homeland – “I can tell you I’m not exactly a budget option!”

He writes that the director of Get Out, Jordan Peele, had originally wanted to cast an American, “but was so impressed by Daniel’s audition that he changed his mind. I’d argue that it was exactly because Daniel wasn’t a real American brother that he was able to do so.”

Jackson also questioned the casting of the British-Nigerian David Oyelowo as Martin Luther King in the 2014 film Selma, saying: “There are some brothers in America who could have been in that movie who would have had a different idea about how King thinks.” Oyelowo has said the film’s original director told him he got the part “because you didn’t come in with any of the baggage of this icon. You just came in and played the man.”

Londoner John Boyega, who played astormtrooper with an American accent in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, tweeted in response to Jackson’s comments: “Black Brits v African American. A stupid ass conflict we don’t have time for.” But other African Americans actors backed Jackson.

Jackson later clarified his remarks, saying that he had not intended “a slam against [British actors] ... it was just a comment about how Hollywood works in an interesting sort of way sometimes”.

Black British actors have spoken repeatedly about feeling the need to move to the US to get meaningful parts, thanks to the lack of diverse roles in UK film and television. In October, Oyelowo told an audience in London that black people’s experience had been “expunged” from the version of Britain shown onscreen, and he felt he had to leave to get work. “Please stop this talent drain. You have to change the demographics of the people who are making these [casting and commissioning] decisions,” he said.



The London actor Idris Elba, who also made his name playing American characters on US TV, has addressed the British parliament calling for greater diversity in the UK media. Last month, shortly after being awarded his best supporting actor Oscar for Moonlight, Mahershala Ali joked: “I’m just so fortunate that Idris and David Oyelowo left me a job. It was very, very kind of them.”

In his article, Harewood describes Jackson as “one of my all-time acting heroes” and stresses that the Pulp Fiction actor’s major point – “that there is still a lack of work for black American performers in Hollywood” – is one with which he wholeheartedly agrees.

He notes that despite having met Jackson only recently, the two men both played King some years ago in a play called The Mountaintop by Katori Hall – Harewood originating the role on the London stage, with Jackson taking over the part when the production transferred to New York.



Harewood was “gutted”, he writes, to be replaced in the American production but understood why it was recast since “it was thought to be too risky to have two unknown black British actors in a play about such an American hero”.

Like Oyelowo, however, he said he felt that, as an outsider, he had brought something particular and fresh to the civil rights leader’s story.

He writes: “When I played King I wasn’t playing a civil rights legend, I was playing a man with tired smelly feet, who was anxious, proud, horny and flirtatious. I wasn’t saddled with the idea of this being sacred territory as perhaps an ‘American brother’ would have [been]. To me it was sheer performance.”