Swinton defends her Ancient role
“Doctor Strange” is Marvel Studios’ most visually ambitious film, and its first dip into its source comics’ mystical bag of tricks. Perhaps its most notable bit of prestidigitation is the casting of daring Oscar winner Tilda Swinton, quite against type — if she can be said to have one.
Swinton has a distinct art house background, including notable collaborations with Derek Jarman, Jim Jarmusch, Luca Guadagnino, Wes Anderson, Bong Joon-ho and the Coen brothers. She also has a track record in what she has called “industrial film,” including the “Chronicles of Narnia” series, but has referred to herself as a “tourist” in that world.
“It’s completely still true,” says the poised, engaged Brit in a hotel meeting room at the Montage Beverly Hills. “But there’s something different now. It’s something more refined. … I just feel invited into these extraordinary experiences. So I’m not touring so much as being sent free passes, golden tickets into extraordinary chocolate factories.”
As far as “industrial film” goes, Marvel Studios has been building near-perfect beasts. Their string of megagrossers racking up impressive critical and audience receptions is unprecedented. Swinton attributes this to a term rarely applied to blockbuster machinery: “auteur filmmakers.”
“It’s entirely an auteur operation,” says the indie star, without a hint of irony. “It’s run by superfans. Primarily by (Marvel Studios President) Kevin Feige, who is the superfan of all superfans. And he is an auteur, properly. And inspired. And knows he must seek out auteur filmmakers. So it’s industrial, in a way.
“I’ve been a fan of Marvel for years — now they are beginning to fly.”
In “Doctor Strange,” Swinton joins Oscar nominees Benedict Cumberbatch as Dr. Stephen Strange, a brilliant neurosurgeon who loses his ability to operate and is set on a course to become the new Sorcerer Supreme; Chiwetel Ejiofor as Strange’s magical colleague Mordo; and Rachel McAdams as Strange’s medical colleague, Christine Palmer. Swinton? She plays the Ancient One, Strange and Mordo’s mystical mentor.
“She is not the Sorcerer Supreme who’s got a deep voice and a kind of muscular, patriarchal presence. She is someone who’s light and flexible, has breath in her,” says Swinton, all 5 feet 11 inches swathed in a smart blue suit, her tousled blond locks cropped close in back. In the film, her pate is entirely hairless and smooth, her lithe frame wrapped in white robes. “She annoys the f— out of (Strange) because he thinks she’s just some flaky old hippie.”
The Ancient One, in the comics, is one of Marvel’s oldest Asian characters — literally and figuratively. The character, who debuted in Dr. Strange’s first appearance, “Strange Tales” No. 110 in 1963, is around 500 years old, male and Tibetan.
Many comic-book figures have undergone transformations in the journey into the mystery of film — just ask any “Guardians of the Galaxy” fan. But “Dr. Strange” is the third recent movie of Marvel properties (“Iron Man 3” and Disney’s “Big Hero 6” being the others) in which long-standing characters have had their Asianness scrubbed out.
BAFTA winner Swinton says director and co-writer Scott Derrickson wrestled with “the whole question of how you make an Ancient One that avoids the perpetuation of this rather noxious racial stereotype of the old Fu Manchu Tibetan geezer on the hill passing on wisdom to the white hero. His first answer was, ‘You make him a woman.’ Which was something (Marvel’s decision makers) were interested to do anyway, because they were looking for an opportunity to bring a woman who’s not 21 and in a bikini into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
“In the name of diversity,” she adds archly.
Derrickson told Variety at the film’s premiere, “In this case, the stereotype of (the Ancient One) had to be undone. I wanted it to be a woman, a middleaged woman. Every iteration of that script played by an Asian woman felt like a ‘dragon lady.’ I’m very sensitive to the history of ‘dragon lady’ representation and Anna May Wong films. I moved away from that. Who’s the magical, mystical woman with secrets that could work in this role? I thought Tilda Swinton .”
This solution was not embraced by all. Oscarwinning filmmaker Chris Tashima, for instance, tweeted, “First of all, a racial stereotype can’t be ‘undone.’ Secondly, replacing it with a white character worsens the situation. #asif ”
George Takei wrote on Facebook: “Marvel must think we’re all idiots. … All the arguments in the world don’t change the fact that Hollywood offers very few roles to Asian actors, and when one comes along, they hire a white actor to do it, for whatever the reasons.”
The Cambridge-educated sometime performance artist Swinton, a longtime ally of the LGBT community, said at the premiere, “People shouting loud and proud about needing more diversity in Hollywood cinema have got us right behind them. It’s very important that they keep shouting. The two things can be true. We can have had good reasons to do this for this film, but that doesn’t mean it’s not important for people to shout loud for that.”