Henry Cavill as
Superman, Rayan Reynolds as
The Green Lantern, Christian Bale as
Batman, Andrew Garfield as
Spider-Man and Chris Hemsworth as
THOR all have one thing in common. Not one of them is American. The folks at Vulture asked some industry insiders for some of the reasons these "American" heroes are being outsourced and some of the answers are somewhat surprising.
The following are just some of the quotes from VULTURE...
The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises casting director John Papsidera had this to say on the subject...
"The ugly truth is that American leading men just aren't terribly manly anymore."
"You look at the list of American leading men, and in their twenties and thirties, they're very boylike. Take Jesse Eisenberg: I put him in Zombieland, but he's not going to play Superman. He's much closer to what Dustin Hoffman turned into than John Wayne or Steve McQueen. It's hard to find movie stars that live up to the needs of the story. Leo [DiCaprio] is growing into it, but for a long time, he seemed young and boylike. Inception was the first time Leo seemed to have fully grown into a man. You need to find guys who carry that heroic-ness with them."
On turning to Canada, the UK and Australia to find leading men Papsidera added...
"There, they're still raised as men. Heath [Ledger] was a man's man. Guys like Henry Cavill, there's an easy masculinity to them. But because of how predominant the sixties and the women's movement were here, guys in America talk about their 'feelings' far more than guys from New Zealand and Australia or Ireland."
United Talent agent Louise Ward offered the following...
"The studios are highly invested in these superheroes as brands. As such, they don't usually want [an actor with] the baggage of another role, and they often can't have an affiliation with another role. Kids are not so easily fooled anymore. They'll say, 'Oh, it's that guy from Gossip Girl!' or 'It's the girl from The O.C.!'"
"I believe there's been a certain feminization of the American male. As a result, there are a lot of 'mama's boys.' Kids are raised like veal. We're afraid to let them play soccer. That kind of nurturing softens what we're used to seeing on the screen. American men aren't men on the screen."
Hawksblueyes: There is much more to this report and it is definitely worth reading. Follow the jump to VULTURE to check it out in it's entirety.