Johansson criticized after being cast as transgender man

NEW YORK — Scarlett Johansson’s plan to portray a transgender man has sparked a backlash.

This week, Johansson was announced to star in Rub & Tug, a film about prostitution ring leader Dante (Tex) Gill, who was born Lois Jean Gill, but identified as a man. Since the announcement, transgender actors and advocates have criticized the production for not casting a trans actor in the role.

Johansson, who is also producing the film, further inflamed critics with a statement to the website Bustle that said criticism “can be directed to Jeffrey Tambor, Jared Leto, and Felicity Huffman’s reps for comment.”

Tambor, Leto and Huffman all received acclaim for playing trans characters. Tambor won two Emmys for his performance on Transparent, though he departed the show last year after he was accused of sexual misconduct by two transgender women — actress Trace Lysette and his former personal assistant, Van Barnes. Leto won an Oscar for his performance in 2013’s Dallas Buyers Club. Huffman was nominated for an Oscar for the 2005 film Transamerica.

Lysette was among those who disapproved of Johansson’s intentions. On Twitter, she wrote: “So you can continue to play us, but we can’t play y’all? Not only do you play us and steal our narrative and our opportunity, but you pat yourselves on the back with trophies and accolades for mimicking what we have lived.”

Jamie Clayton, a transgender actress who stars in Netflix’s Sense8, dared Johansson and the filmmakers to cast trans actors in non-trans parts. “Actors who are trans never even get to audition for anything other than roles of trans characters,” Clayton tweeted. “We can’t even get in the room.”

Johansson’s spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

Johansson has come under fire before for playing a role that prompted some outrage. In last year’s Ghost in the Shell, she played the robot character known in Masamune Shirow’s original manga series as Motoko Kusanagi. Critics called it another example of Hollywood’s long history of whitewashing Asian characters.