Local & State Headlines

Group has concerns about new comedy

• A local advocacy group speaks out about mental retardation jokes in the movie “Tropic Thunder.”

Holly McCarthy

ALBANY — Members of the Albany Advocacy Resource Center attended the Wednesday-night screening of the movie “Tropic Thunder” at Carmike Cinemas Wynnsong 16 to speak out against what they believe is an offensive portrayal of people with intellectual disabilities.

“All people have disabilities,” Lou Johnson, Albany ARC community resource coordinator, said. “We don’t need to laugh at or make fun of anyone with disabilities.”

The movie, starring Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr., is billed on its Web site as an action comedy about a group of conceited actors who set out to make a pricey war movie, but end up in real fighting situations in a Southeast Asian jungle.

Albany ARC’s parent organization, The Arc of the United States, takes issue with Ben Stiller’s character, Tugg Speedman, a fading action star who failed at an attempt to win an Oscar by portraying a mentally handicapped person. That movie, “Simple Jack”, is featured in “Tropic Thunder” as a movie-within-a-movie. Stiller sports a bowl haircut and bad teeth as Simple Jack.

Johnson said she has not seen the movie, but The Arc sent her office a newsletter with a synopsis of the movie and opinions of disability advocates who had viewed it, including the executive director of the National Down Syndrome Congress.

Although the newsletter The Arc distributed calls for a boycott of the movie, Johnson said Albany ARC is not protesting, merely “speaking out on behalf of people with intellectual disabilities.”

Members of national organizations such as the Special Olympics and the American Association of People with Disabilities protested “Tropic Thunder” at the Monday premiere in Los Angeles.

According to Associated Press reports, star Robert Downey Jr. said the film is open to interpretation.

“You know, if I want to protest something because it offends me, that’s my right as an American,” Downey is quoted as saying, “and it’s also any artist’s right to say and do whatever they want to do.”