(Molly Bruns, Headline USA) Actor Ben Stiller refused to apologize to the cancel culture mob for the 2008 comedy Tropic Thunder, which he wrote, directed and starred in.
Stiller responded to a tweet that accused him of apologizing for the movie, as it faces calls to be removed from streaming platforms, the Daily Wire reported.
“Please stop apologizing for doing this movie,” the tweet read. “It was and still is funny AF… Even funnier now with cancel culture the way it is… I was DYING laughing when I first saw it back in the day and so was everyone else.”
@BenStiller Please stop apologizing for doing this movie. It was and still is funny AF… Even funnier now with cancel culture the way it is. It's a MOVIE. Ya'll can just get over it. I was DYING laughing when I first saw it back in the day and so was everyone else. pic.twitter.com/HEyR0ztQD4
— Benny S. (@BennySings) February 21, 2023
Stiller, 57, responded to the tweet saying he is “proud” of the movie and claimed it was “controversial” from the start.
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. 🙏✊😊
— Ben Stiller (@BenStiller) February 21, 2023
Many users responded to Stiller, calling the movie “one of the funniest” they’ve seen and “perfect.”
The film centers around a group of actors shooting a war film and finding themselves in the midst of an actual war zone. The actors are forced to use their acting skills to escape.
One of the characters, a method actor named Kirk Lazarus played by Robert Downey Jr., gets skin pigmentation surgery to appear as a black man for the film.
Downey defended the use of blackface in the film, claiming in a 2020 episode of The Joe Rogan Experience that the purpose of the film is to showcase how wrong it is.
“I think that it’s never an excuse to do something that’s out of place and out of its time, but to me it blasted the cap on [the issue],” Downey said. “I think having a moral psychology is Job 1. Sometimes, you just gotta go, ‘Yeah, I effed up.’ In my defense, ‘Tropic Thunder’ is about how wrong [blackface] is, so I take exception.”
The movie previously came under fire for the use of the word “retard,” and was targeted by advocacy groups for people with disabilities, including the Special Olympics.
