It appears that Scarlett Johansson has not learned from her blunder of playing a Japanese cyborg woman in the movie Ghost in the Shell. She has recently taken on the role of a transgender man in the upcoming film Rub & Tug.
This, of course, is not the first instance of a cisgender actor playing the role of a trans person in a film. Recent notable instances of this can be found with Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club), Felicity Huffan (Transamerica), and Jeffrey Tambor (Transparent). Even before these more recent examples, Hilary Swank won both an Oscar and a Golden Globe for her role as murdered trans man Brandon Teena in Boys Don’t Cry.
There has been some obvious outcry due to this casting of Johansson. Not only would it make more sense to cast a trans person in this role, an additional issue is that the reverse of this situation would never happen. Transgender actors are not even given the opportunity to play cisgender people in films and television shows. It makes little sense to give the few existing roles trans actors are considered for to cisgender people.
Scarlett Johansson issued a brief statement in response to this outcry.
“Tell them that they can be directed to Jeffrey Tambor, Jared Leto, and Felicity Huffman’s reps for comment.”