Michelle Rodriguez Tells GLAAD To Lighten Up Over Her ‘Tomboy’ Role
Michelle Rodriguez is taking on another controversial role, this time starring as a hitman turned hitwoman, in Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale, and although the film isn’t due out until 2017, G.L.A.A.D. (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) is already criticizing Rodriguez and Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale for the way gender reassignment is used in the film. In response, Michelle publicly asked the organization to take a step back and realize their efforts might be better spent elsewhere.
Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale Enlists Michelle Rodriguez To Play A Unique Role
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Thirty-seven-year-old Michelle Rodriguez will play the lead role in Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale, that of a male assassin who falls prey to the very gangsters who had previously employed him. Turning the tables on Rodriguez, the criminals deliver Michelle’s character to a man known as The Doctor. When Michelle’s Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale character awakens, she finds that The Doctor has transformed him into a female and naturally enraged by this violation, Rodriguez seeks out the gangsters for retribution.
“I can’t be the slut,”Ms. Rodriguez told Us Weekly. “I cannot be just the girlfriend. I can’t be the girl who gets empowered because she’s been raped. I can’t be the girl who gets empowered and then dies.”
The Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale actress revealed long ago that she was going to have create her own unique niche for herself, realizing that if she was going to become a typecast actress, Michelle wanted to decide for herself which kinds of characters she would be relegated. Ms. Rodriguez adds that she has never (and will never) take the kinds of roles that are seen as the roads to quick riches and fame. Instead, Michelle wants to choose the roles that best appeal to her as an actress and a performer.
“But you know, it’s a Catch-22,” Rodriguez said. “It’s helped me and it’s screwed me. I’ve stuck to my guns and I’m proud and people get it. But I also haven’t carried a movie since Girlfight.”
G.L.A.A.D. Attacks Michelle Rodriguez Over Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale
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While Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale is still in pre-production stages, G.L.A.A.D. has already begun a campaign of hate and criticism directed solely at Tomboy‘s star, Ms. Rodriguez. Publicly expressing their disappointment in a film they have yet to see on screen, the organization has said that Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale is using a life-saving procedure in the most sensationalized way to move the film’s plot forward.
While gender reassignment is surely vital to a transgender person’s emotional and psychological well being, it is hardly life-saving, just as being a transgender individual isn’t at all life-threatening. It seems G.L.A.A.D. is more guilty of sensationalism than Michelle Rodriguez or Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale.
Ms. Rodriguez, who identifies as bisexual, was quick to respond to the organization’s assertions.
“If anything, it’s freaking promoting it [trans rights],” Michelle said, according to Entertainment Weekly. “You know what I mean? No press is bad press, baby. I remember a day when white people were playing black people. So, it’s just about the evolution. Thank [Bruce] Jenner for becoming who he became and now you have a popular subject matter that nobody wanted to make a movie about and now everybody’s on it.”
Nick Adams, G.L.A.A.D.’s director of programs for transgender media, suggests that films such as Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale have the power to undermine the efforts of the transgender community. Adams seems to dismiss the claims by Ms. Rodriguez that any publicity is good publicity.
Walter Hill’s Tomboy, a Revenger’s Tale, starring Michelle Rodriguez and Sigourney Weaver, has been co-written by Denis Hamill and is scheduled for a 2017 theatrical release.
[Featured image by Jason Merritt/Getty Images]
