British Roles for British Actors!

Actor Dominic West invoking the rhetoric of both Gordon Brown and the BNP:

"But I was sort of smarting from Russell Crowe coming over here and playing Robin Hood and all these foreigners coming over here and stealing our great heroes. I felt I was striking a blow back by being a Brit playing a foreigner.

"I'd love to play Robin Hood but I'd particularly like to play all those parts Johnny Depp plays that are English people like the Earl of Rochester."

Now, maybe I've misunderstood the point of acting, but surely the point is that those actor types can play people from different nationalities and with different accents? Sure, I realise that Depp is the exception that proves the rule - his English actor appears to be channelling the very cliche of a cockney whenever he plays someone from this side of the Atlantic - but most actors can play people from a different country. Rather like Dominic West playing - and becoming famous for starring as - Irish American cop Jimmy McNulty. 

West's failure to understand that film makers can cast who the fuck they like in their productions nearly destroys his argument as much as the charge of hypocrisy does. Ultimately he comes across as an ignorant bore - someone who hasn't got the parts he wants and is blaming everyone else for his misfortune. He's someone who should know better - or just shut the fuck up.