Typecasting is really rampant in Hollywood, and because I played a costumed character and did it successfully, it was a real stigma.
Satisfying as that 'Cabaret' role was, it is not the only thing I do. But Hollywood is somewhat limited in its perspective about what it is you do or don't do.
I sort of went 'Oh, great. I'm getting these great roles and I love doing them, but I'm going to be Anthony Perkins for the rest of my life.'
When I was young, I dreamt of being a starlet in Hollywood. But there comes a point in every African American's life when you realize the limitations, that you could only play maids or some little supporting role. Even Lena Horne couldn't get good parts.
On the last couple of movies I made - big-budget Hollywood movies - I really missed being able to create my own material.
After 'Wedding Crashers' I was just surprised as to the lack of comedic female material there is. So I had to start working and getting stuff out there for myself.
I'm hardly Hollywood material - they're interested in youth and perfection and I lay no claims to either. It's not a place that's particularly interested in talent.
The action star's life is very short. Back in Asia, I can do whatever I want to do. I'm the producer, I'm the director, I can do so many things, but in Hollywood any time I present a script they say: "No, no, no, Rush Hour 3, Rush Hour 4."
I always felt Jimmy was trapped in Hollywood. He felt it himself. He loved aviation so much and he wanted to be able to do more of that. He somehow just got stuck here.
In theater, you can be free. That's how Lin-Manuel Miranda got to do the most revolutionary piece of theater with 'Hamilton': color-blind casting in roles in which they would never cast Latinos if it were a film or TV show. It just goes to show that Hollywood and cable are way behind.
The motion picture made in Hollywood, if it is to create art at all, must do so within such strangling limitations of subject and treatment that it is a blind wonder it ever achieves any distinction beyond the purely mechanical slickness of a glass and chromium bathroom.
Imagine if Lin-Manuel Miranda had tried to do 'Hamilton' first in Hollywood. They would have told him, 'The forefathers weren't Latino or black. They didn't speak in hip hop.' That would never had gotten going in Hollywood ever. But theater let Lin-Manuel him do it, and he created an incredible masterpiece.
This same habitual blindness to spiritual, substantive dimensions of every significant challenge continues to handicap Hollywood.
When a show becomes successful, people want to hire the people on the show for other things, and we would all try to do other things, but we could never end up doing them, so casting directors were just like, 'Enough of them! Don't touch the 'Glee' kids, because you can't use them!'
