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Article: The only guy who could pull it off: Robert Downey Jr.'s minstrel show in Tropic Thunder.(Film)(Movie review)
- Article from:
- Esquire
- Article date:
- August 1, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Hearst Communications, reprinted with permission of Hearst. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Robert Downey Jr.'s chocolate complexion, kinky short hair, and "hot damn!" cadence in the Vietnam satire Tropic Thunder is blood kin to the shoe-polish-stained cheeks, Brillopad pompadours, and declarative "yessum, massa!" of yore. Honky is still playing Negro. But once the lights dim, it's hard to tell what's more shocking: that Robert Downey Jr. is in blackface or that after about two minutes, you stop thinking about it.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Hollywood hasn't manufactured this kind of wide-release minstrelsy since that nice Jewish boy Gene Wilder delivered his hilariously inept and subversive strut with Richard Pryor ...