History Main / PlaysGreatEthnics

* Comedian Fred Armisen is American, but his mother is Venezuelan and his father is half-German half-Korean. This has helped him play a number of sketch comedy characters on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'', ''Series/{{Portlandia}}'', and ''Series/DocumentaryNow''. Armisen's played white guys, black guys, white women, Colombian men, Italians, even UsefulNotes/BarackObama.

* Creator/JasonMomoa has Native Hawaiian and Caucasian ancestry, plus a touch of Native American, and has played several mixed-race characters. He has played characters that share his half-Native ancestry at least twice (''Series/TheRedRoad'' and ''Series/{{Frontier}}''), [[Series/GameOfThrones the ambiguously brown Dothraki warlord Khal Drogo]], and the Polynesian-inspired King of Atlantis Comicbook/{{Aquaman}} (who is blonde and Caucasian in the comics).

* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory'', ''Film/OperationFinale'', ''Series/ScenesFromAMarriage2021'', and ''Series/MoonKnight2022'' -- with, for a bonus, at least two different accents in the last), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''[[note]]Though actually French, as his HistoricalDomainCharacter, King John, was the last of England's Angevin Kings, who hailed from the House of Anjou[[/note]]), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').

* Creator/ChristopherLee, though British-born, played all sorts of foreigners (including Arabs and Chinese, with the possible zenith being [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Ali_Jinnah Jinnah]], the founder of Pakistan). His facility with languages and part-Italian ancestry was a large factor.

* Creator/SylvesterStallone, a man of Italian, Ukrainian, and French descent, is frequently cast as an ethnic Italian-American (Film/{{Rocky}} Balboa), but has also played a Hungarian-American in ''Film/{{FIST}}'', the son of a Swede in ''Film/JudgeDredd'', an AmbiguouslyHuman alien in ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxyVol2'', and a man of mixed German, Indian, Swedish, and Native American ancestry in the [[Franchise/{{Rambo}} ''Rambo'' series]].

* [[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0193295/ Cliff Curtis]], a Maori from New Zealand, has played characters who are [[Film/{{Blow}} Latin]] [[Film/CollateralDamage American]] [[Film/{{Colombiana}} from]] [[Film/RunawayJury multiple]] [[Film/TrainingDay countries]], Egyptian, [[Film/TheMajestic Saudi]], [[Film/ThreeKings Iraqi]], [[Film/{{Risen}} Hebrew]] (as UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}}, no less), [[Film/TheFountain Spanish]], [[Film/AThousandWords Indian]], [[Film/LiveFreeOrDieHard African American]] and Chechen in addition to Maori.

* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory'', ''Film/OperationFinale'', and ''Series/ScenesFromAMarriage2021''), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''[[note]]Though actually French, as his HistoricalDomainCharacter, King John, was the last of England's Angevin Kings, who hailed from the House of Anjou[[/note]]), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').

* Brazilian actor of Italian/Portuguese descent Creator/RodrigoSantoro has played a number of roles like [[Film/ThreeHundred Xerxes]] (a Persian Emperor), [[Literature/BenHur Jesus]] (a Middle Eastern Jew), [[Film/{{Che}} Raúl Castro]] (a white Cuban) and [[Series/{{Westworld}} Hector Escaton]] (a Mexican artificial program). And those are just the roles Americans are familiar with; he once played [[Literature/TheThreeMusketeers D'Artagnan]] in one of his native country's movies.

* Creator/YulBrynner (of Swiss, Russian, and Siberian ancestry) played [[Theatre/TheKingAndI King Mongkut of Siam]], [[Film/TheTenCommandments Pharaoh Ramses of Egypt]], [[Literature/TheBrothersKaramazov a Russian]], [[Film/TheMagnificentSeven1960 a Cajun]], a Native American chief, a Cossack, a Mexican, and many other "ethnic" roles.

* Swedish actor Creator/PeterStormare has played a German "nihilist" in ''Film/TheBigLebowski'', a Russian cosmonaut in ''Film/{{Armageddon}}'', an Italian mercenary in ''Film/TheBrothersGrimm'', a drunken and violent Frenchman in ''Film/{{Chocolat}}'', a drug lord from a fictional Eastern European nation in ''Series/{{Arrow}}'' - the list goes on.

* Creator/BenKingsley was born in England to an English mother and Indian father. His roles have included several Jews (of various nationalities) as well as many other Middle Eastern characters, Indians ([[Film/{{Gandhi}} one of which]] was his breakout role and won him an Oscar), Americans, Russians, Italians, at least one Frenchman ([[Film/{{Hugo}} Georges Méliès]]), a [[Film/EndersGame Māori]], and an Egyptian (Potiphar). In ''Film/IronMan3'', he plays a Middle Eastern terrorist [[spoiler: who's really a British actor who looks foreign enough to pretend to be a vaguely-Asian person, lampshading this trope.]] In fact, many people have assumed he's Jewish due to the number he played, though Kingsley corrected them that no, so far as he knows that isn't the case (his mother was born out of wedlock and did not talk about her background, so it's possible but unconfirmed).

* Creator/EliWallach. His film debut was ''Film/BabyDoll'' playing a Sicilian gangster; he played a Mexican bandit in not only ''Film/{{The Magnificent Seven|1960}}'' but ''Film/TheGoodTheBadAndTheUgly''; an Asian warlord in ''Literature/LordJim''; another Italian-American crime boss in ''Film/TheGodfatherPartIII''. Wallach seemed to play every ethnicity except his actual Jewish-American background.

* Creator/MilaKunis has a Jewish Ukrainian background. She's played a Mexican and other NonSpecificallyForeign or AmbiguouslyBrown characters.

* Olek Krupa, born in Poland, typically plays all manner of Eastern European characters.
* Reece Ritchie, an Englishman of partial South African descent, has played Iraqi, Greek, Indian, Iranian, Minoan, Australian, Persian, Israeli, and Egyptian characters.
* In ''Series/SpartacusBloodAndSand'', Māori actor Antonio Te Maioha plays a North African character, Barca.
* Creator/FMurrayAbraham is of Syrian and Italian descent and has portrayed Cuban, Mexican, Italian, Turkish, French, Russian, and Ashkenazi Jewish characters, to name a few.
* Israeli actor Yigal Naor has played Jews (obviously), Persians, Romanians, and Arabs. He's particularly popular for his ability to speak Iraqi Arabic, which he learned from his Iraqi-born parents and which is distinct from Standard Arabic.
* Creator/AnthonyRuivivar is himself a mix of Filipino and Chinese on his father's side and Scottish and German on his mother's side. Several of the characters he's played are Hispanic and in ''Series/{{Banshee}}'', he played Alex Longshadow, a Native American.
* Creator/LesleyAnnBrandt is South African - with her full ethnic background including East Indian, German, Dutch, Spanish, and Khoisan - and frequently plays AmbiguouslyBrown characters. Notably her StarMakingRole - Naevia in ''Series/SpartacusBloodAndSand'' - avoided giving her character's country of origin.
--> "In Thailand, I'm mistaken as Thai, in New Zealand I've been told I look Polynesian, Indians can see my Indian heritage and in America, I've been told I look African American or Latin American. I like it that way."
* Creator/MyrnaLoy - before becoming a Hollywood star - had exotic looks that allowed her to get several Asian roles (in {{Yellowface}} of course). ''Film/TheMaskOfFuManchu'' for example.
* Noble Johnson was an African-American actor who, from UsefulNotes/TheSilentAgeOfHollywood through the late '40s, portrayed not only characters of African descent, but also American Indians, Mexicans, Arabs, Polynesians, and at least two Eastern Europeans, often using makeup of his own design.
* Brazilian actor of Italian/Portuguese descent Creator/RodrigoSantoro has played a number of roles like [[Film/ThreeHundred Xerxes]] (a Persian Emperor), [[Literature/BenHur Jesus]] (a Middle Eastern Jew), [[Film/{{Che}} Raúl Castro]] (a white Cuban) and [[Series/{{Westworld}} Hector Escaton]] (a Mexican artificial program). And those are just the roles Americans are familiar with; he once played [[Literature/TheThreeMusketeers D'Artagnan]] in one of his native country's movies.
* Creator/DolphLundgren has played more than half a dozen Russian characters, despite actually being Swedish.
* Israeli Creator/BrianGeorge played the Pakistani restaurateur Babu Bhatt in ''Seinfeld'' and Raj's Indian father in ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'', and to Julian Bashir's father in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine''.
* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory'', ''Film/OperationFinale'', and ''Series/ScenesFromAMarriage2021''), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''[[note]]Though actually French, as his HistoricalDomainCharacter, King John, was the last of England's Angevin Kings, who hailed from the House of Anjou[[/note]]), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').
* Actress Q'orianka Kilcher, with a Swiss mother and Peruvian father of indigenous descent, played ''UsefulNotes/{{Pocahontas}}'' (native-American but from a totally different tribe and hemisphere), Tiger Lily in ''Series/{{Neverland}}'' and Princess Kaʻiulani of Hawaii (Polynesian).
* Creator/BoobooStewart is of Japanese/Chinese/Korean and Scottish/Russian/Blackfoot descent, and as a result is ethnically ambiguous. He's played many Continental Native American characters (''Film/{{Twilight}}'', ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'', ''Series/{{Westworld}}'') but has also played East Asian (''Film/WhiteFrog''), Middle Eastern (''Film/{{Descendants}}''), and Native Hawaiian (''Series/HawaiiFiveO'').
* British actor Joseph Long is of Italian descent and has played Italian, Greek, Cypriot, Spanish, Chilean, Russian, Israeli, and Arabic characters.
* Comedian Fred Armisen is American, but his mother is Venezuelan and his father is half-German half-Korean. This has helped him play a number of sketch comedy characters on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'', ''Series/{{Portlandia}}'', and ''Series/DocumentaryNow''. Armisen's played white guys, black guys, white women, Colombian men, Italians, even UsefulNotes/BarackObama.
* Creator/OliviaHussey is Argentine-born, with only a hint of a tan, and has played Italian (''Film/RomeoAndJuliet1968''), Ancient Hebrew (''Series/JesusOfNazareth''), Indian (''Mother Theresa of Calcutta''), and Spanish (''[[Film/LostHorizon1973 Lost Horizon]]'') in addition to white British roles.

* Creator/NancyKwan with her Eurasian looks managed to invert this, as she'd be given mild {{Yellowface}} to look more convincingly Asian but would also wear blue contacts to play white roles. She sometimes played Tahitian and Polynesian as well.
* Creator/JohnRhysDavies is Welsh but because of his coloring, he is often cast as Hispanic or Middle Eastern characters.

* Creator/MadsMikkelsen is Danish, but has played characters who are French, German, Russian, Greek, Lithuanian, Albanian, and even East Iranian. This is probably at least partly due to [[WhatTheHellIsThatAccent his accent]].
* Korean-American (possibly the Very First Korean-American) actor Philip Ahn only portrayed Korean characters a handful of times in his almost 50-year career. Early in his career was promoted by studios as "Chinese", by the logic that most [[ViewersAreMorons Americans wouldn't know what Korea was]], and after World War II broke out was typecast as Japanese characters, to the degree that some audiences thought he actually was Japanese and sent him death threats.
* Early in his television career, Creator/LeonardNimoy (Caucasian of Ukrainian Jewish background) was often cast as (in his own words) "Mexicans, Italians, all kinds of ethnic types; this was before ethnic awareness."

* French actor Creator/LouisJourdan has played Spaniards and other Latin lovers. He's also played the Romanian Film/CountDracula, as well as an exiled Saudi Prince in ''Film/{{Octopussy}}''. He's proven that he can do American accents that fool even the most American of Americans on a 1950s episode of ''Series/WhatsMyLine''.

* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory'' and ''Film/OperationFinale''), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''[[note]]Though actually French, as his HistoricalDomainCharacter, King John, was the last of England's Angevin Kings, who hailed from the House of Anjou[[/note]]), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').

* Creator/BoobooStewart is of [[MixedAncestry Japanese/Chinese/Korean and Scottish/Russian/Blackfoot]] descent, and as a result is ethnically ambiguous. He's played many Continental Native American characters (''Film/{{Twilight}}'', ''Film/XMenDaysOfFuturePast'', ''Series/{{Westworld}}'') but has also played East Asian (''Film/WhiteFrog''), Middle Eastern (''Film/{{Descendants}}''), and Native Hawaiian (''Series/HawaiiFiveO'').

* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory'' and ''Film/OperationFinale''), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').

This refers to casting practice, and in the case of TropeCodifier Creator/PeterStormare it has even achieved the status of CastingGag. It refers to "international" or "ethnic" - at any rate not American or British - actors who are considered to somehow look or be able to act so vaguely but conspicuously foreign that they can be used for any nationality. It's AsLongAsItSoundsForeign and GratuitousForeignLanguage applied to casting. However, ButNotTooForeign is often in effect because you'll want someone who speaks good English (even though intentionally accented) and rather panders to viewers' expectations than give an accurate portrayal of a specific ethnic identity which also means that the character's background might be very vague as long as it's foreign. Note that Plays Great Ethnics can have the same UnfortunateImplications as MistakenNationality.

* Creator/StanaKatic is a Canadian of Serbian descent (her parents in fact hailed from the Dalmatia region of what is now Croatia) and is fluent in five languages, as well as able to speak to varying degrees in a few more. She's played Israeli, French, German, American, voiced [[VideoGame/BatmanArkhamCity a Persian in a video game]] and could probably rock a British accent if she ever got the chance.

* Creator/TaikaWaititi is Māori and Jewish, but has played Indians, Romani, Vietnamese, and [[{{Film/GreenLantern}} Inuit]]. And a [[Film/ThorRagnarok rock alien being]]. And ''[[Film/JojoRabbit Hitler]]''.

* Music/VanessaHudgens has a part Native American, part Irish father and a Filipino mother, with also Chinese and Spanish ancestry, and has been cast in mainly Hispanic roles, and as being from a fictional East Asian country much like Thailand in ''Film/{{Thunderbirds}}''. In an interview, she said that she had auditioned for the role of Esmerelda in an amateur production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame because "[[https://youtu.be/Ev2ToILLMTk?t=1m53s I've got her ethnic looks going on]]".

[[caption-width-right:350:Guess what his real ethnicity is: [[note]]It's Māori. And if you picked "caveman", you get a DopeSlap. Clockwise from top left: ''Film/ThreeKings'', ''Film/TrainingDay'', ''Film/TenThousandBC'', and ''Film/WhaleRider''.[[/note]]]]

* Creator/SachaBaronCohen is a London-born Jew who has played a [[Film/{{Borat}} Kazakh]] ([[Film/BoratSubsequentMoviefilm twice]]), a [[Film/TheDictator North African]], a [[Film/SweeneyToddTheDemonBarberOfFleetStreet fake Italian]], and [[Film/TalladegaNightsTheBalladOfRickyBobby three]] [[Film/{{Hugo}} French]][[Film/LesMiserables2012 men]]. %% Family name is Baron Cohen.

* Creator/TaikaWaititi is Māori, but has played Indians, Romani, Vietnamese, and [[{{Film/GreenLantern}} Inuit]]. And a [[Film/ThorRagnarok rock alien being]].

* Creator/OscarIsaac is Guatemalan-born, and has played various ethnicities -- including Polish (in ''Show Me A Hero''), Egyptian (in ''Film/XMenApocalypse''), Roman (in ''Film/{{Agora}}'') Jewish (in ''Film/TheNativityStory''), Armenian (in ''[[Film/ThePromise2016 The Promise]]''), English (in ''[[Film/RobinHood2010 Robin Hood]]''), Iraqi (in ''Film/BodyOfLies''), Russian (in ''[[Film/WE2011 W.E.]]'') and French (in ''At Eternity's Gate'').

* Jewish Austro-Hungarian actor Creator/PeterLorre seldom ever played an actual Austro-Hungarian or Jewish character during the height of his career. He was usually cast as ambiguously foreign. One of his first starring roles was as a Japanese Film/CharlieChan rip-off named Mr. Moto. He also played Le Chiffre in the 1954 TV version of ''Literature/CasinoRoyale''.

* [[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0193295/ Cliff Curtis]], a Maori from New Zealand, has played characters who are Latin American from multiple countries, Egyptian, [[Film/TheMajestic Saudi]], [[Film/ThreeKings Iraqi]], [[Film/{{Risen}} Hebrew]] (as UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}}, no less), Spanish, [[Film/AThousandWords Indian]], African American and Chechen in addition to Maori.

** As an actress of Mexican descent, Melissa Villaseñor is the natural go-to for Latina impressions, or in the case of 6ix9ine, [[CrosscastRole Latinos]]. But she's also played Elaine Quijano (Filipino-American), Music/LadyGaga (Italian-American), and Sue Perkins (Cornish-English).

* Creator/JasonMomoa has Native Hawaiian and Caucasian ancestry and has played several mixed raced characters. He has played characters that share his half-Native ancestry at least twice (''Series/TheRedRoad'' and ''Series/{{Frontier}}''), [[Series/GameOfThrones the ambiguously brown Dothraki warlord Khal Drogo]], and the Polynesian-inspired King of Atlantis Comicbook/{{Aquaman}} (who is blonde and Caucasian in the comics).

* Creator/LouDiamondPhilips is of Scots-Irish, Filipino, Cherokee, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, and Hawaiian descent. As you might expect, he plays characters from a variety of races, though most often Latinos.

* [[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0888937/ Titos Vandis]], Greek, who played (among others) three unrelated characters of varying ethnicities on ''Series/BarneyMiller'', none of whom were Greek; there was a Puerto Rican, a [[UsefulNotes/{{Romani}} Romani]], and another one.

* Brazilian actor of Italian/Portuguese descent Creator/RodrigoSantoro has played a number of roles like [[Film/ThreeHundred Xerxes]] (a Persian Emperor), [[Literature/BenHur Jesus]] (a Middle-Eastern Jew), [[Film/{{Che}} Raul Castro]] (a Cuban) and [[Series/{{Westworld}} Hector Escaton]] (a Mexican artificial program). And those are just the roles Americans are familiar with; he once played [[Literature/TheThreeMusketeers D'Artagnan]] in one of his native country's movies.

* Justin Baldoni is an Italian Jew who mostly plays Arabs and [[LatinLover Latin Lovers]] (most notably Rafael Solano on Series/JaneTheVirgin).