Ben Stiller isn’t sure he would have “ventured” to make “Tropic Thunder” in today’s comedy environment.
“I doubt it,” Stiller told Collider, when asked if “Tropic Thunder” could be made today.
“Obviously, in this environment, edgier comedy is just harder to do,” the actor explained. “Definitely not at the scale we made it at, too, in terms of the economics of the business. I think even at the time we were fortunate to get it made, and I credit that, actually, to Steven Spielberg and DreamWorks. He read it and was like, ‘Alright, let’s make this thing.’ It’s a very inside movie when you think about it.”
BEN STILLER SAYS HE NEVER APOLOGIZED FOR ‘TROPIC THUNDER’: I’M ‘PROUD OF IT’
The 58-year-old movie star pointed to Robert Downey Jr.’s now-controversial role in the movie. In “Tropic Thunder,” Downey Jr. undergoes “pigmentation alteration” surgery in order to play a Black soldier in a film.
“But yeah, the idea of Robert playing that character who’s playing an African American character, I mean, incredibly dicey,” Stiller said in the new interview. “Even at the time, of course, it was dicey too. The only reason we attempted it was I felt like the joke was very clear in terms of who that joke was on – actors trying to do anything to win awards. But now, in this environment, I don’t even know if I would have ventured to do it, to tell you the truth. I’m being honest.”
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Downey has previously defended his “Tropic Thunder” role.
“I was looking back at ‘All in the Family,’ and they had a little disclaimer that they were running at the beginning of the show,” Downey said during a 2023 episode of Rob Lowe’s “Literally!” podcast. “People should look it up, exactly what it is, because it is an antidote to this clickbait addiction to grievance that [people seem] to have with everything these days.”
“The language was saying, ‘Hey, this is the reason that we’re doing these things that, in a vacuum, you could pick apart and say are wrong and bad,’” Downey continued. “There used to be an understanding with an audience, and I’m not saying that the audience is no longer understanding – I’m saying that things have gotten very muddied. The spirit that [Ben] Stiller directed and cast and shot ‘Tropic Thunder’ in was, essentially, as a railing against all of these tropes that are not right and [that] had been perpetuated for too long.”
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Downey earned an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actor with “Tropic Thunder.” He was also nominated for a Golden Globe alongside his co-star Tom Cruise.
Stiller insisted he’s never apologized for “Tropic Thunder” in a 2023 social media post.
“I make no apologies for Tropic Thunder. Don’t know who told you that. It’s always been a controversial movie since when we opened. Proud of it and the work everyone did on it,” Stiller wrote online.
The actor has maintained the movie was made to make fun of actors who go to great lengths to get nominated for awards.
