#actors with dwarfism

[a-little-revolution]

It seems like you're a big fan of Warwick Davis, I was wondering if there are any other little people actors you really like, especially women and trans/nb actors?

Hello! Yes I do enjoy Warwick Davis! Willow (1988) remains one of my favourite LP films, and I've really enjoyed his career of fantastical characters.

Like a lot of industries, white men make up a lot of the most famous Little actors (Warwick Davis, Peter Dinklage, Danny Woodburn, Martin Klebba, Verne Troyer), so I'm happy to mention some of my favourites outside that group!

Linda Hunt is a favourite of mine - she's a Hollywood veteran best known for her role in The Year of Living Dangerously (1982) where she was the first actor to win an academy award for playing someone of the opposite sex!! She's been on Broadway, done tv, film, and voice acting! You may know her as Lady Proxima in Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018).

If you think you don't know Deep Roy, chances are you do! He's been a scale actor in countless award winning films including Star Wars (1980), Star Trek (2009-2016), The Never Ending Story (1984), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) and so many more! We owe so many beloved characters to scale actors and people hardly know it - Deep Roy has been responsible for dozens of them, I adore him.

Despite Patty Maloney's vast career in acting, I know her as Lois Addams from The Addams Family (1991)! Before my time she was in a variety of tv shows and films including Star Trek Voyager (1996), Little House on the Prairie (1982), and The Lord of the Rings (1978).

Cara Mailey is a young actress, author, presenter and activist! She's known for her role in Derry Girls (2018) and Read all About It! (2021), as well as her ebook "I Got This" - which speaks on her experience living with Achondroplasia. I wanted to be sure to give her an honourable mention because at only fifteen she's already become an activist for the LP community! I'm excited to see how her career evolves!

Thank you for the ask! Be sure to check these folks out!

[tyrannuspitch]

loki odinson, the nine realms' tallest short king,

[nessa007]

Why do the dwarfs look cartoony like its life action they are supposed to look like short humans not like they got dragged out of the animated movie. Like what is the point of live action if they dont make it look realistic. If this is honestly the way they are going with it i might have preffered the woodland spirits or wathever they wanted to turn them into originally.

me @ disney

[sweetthoughtsbymarie]

October 30th

Peter Dinklage – Actor (Achondroplasia Dwarfism) Dinklage has a common form of dwarfism known as achondroplasia, and stands 4 ft 5 in (1.35 m) tall. He has used his celebrity status to raise social awareness of dwarfism. He was born June 11th 1969, like a lot of disabled people Peter had to come to terms with his diagnosis and let go of his anger and bitterness. He is married and has children.…

[xremus-is-deadx]

No one will ever do a live adaptation of Snow White as well as Mirror Mirror did.

-Fantastic costume designs. Because it wasn't made by Disney, her outfits are different but still beautiful.

-Iconic cast (like I love lots of members of the cast)

-So magical but at the same time very real

-Funny

-ACTORS WITH DWARFISM PLAYING THE 7 DWARFS!!!! ALL OF THEM, 7 DIFFERENT ACTORS, ALL OF THEM REALLY INCREDIBLE ACTORS PERFECT FOR THE ROLES!!!

-Actually focuses on characters other than just Snow, which makes the story so interesting and unique whilst still sticking to the basics of the story

Overall, Mirror Mirror is such a good live action adaptation. It's not 100% true to the animated Disney film, and it's a bit more heavy plot-wise, but it's INCREDIBLE!!

Live Action Snow White

I hate how this could have been down WELL if Disney cared.

- Have actors with Dwarfism act as the Dwarves + consult experts and people w/ dwarfism on avoiding stereotypes and showing them as actual people.

- If you want a non-white Snow White, go for East Asia, specifically Japan, since there's some Japanese culture you could reference in regards to 'hair dark as night." Like the book In Praise of Shadows, you could have subtle nods to Japanese Aestheticism. (Although Rachel Z LITERALLY looks like a real life Disney Princess. If she's Snow White, they should have leaned into her Colombian + Polish background).

- Hell, if you want someone who isn't white or East Asian, you could get an actress with albinism or even vitiligo (would look a bit like snow?). That would be really cool, actually.

- You could make some interesting references to Japanese history and fashion. Like Kanzashi sticks as hair accessories AND weapons. They were sometimes used to fend off attacks & assassinate political rivals. Some Kanzashi has bells hanging from them that jingle in the wind. That would explain why the Prince would find her in the woods. I feel like we'd all be confused about hearing bells in the middle of nowhere lol.

- You could go with practical effects and actually make everything look magical. and REAL. NO CURSED POLAR EXPRESS CGI DWARVES PLEASE AND THANK YOU!!!

I hate that Disney is doing cheap rage bait and are happy to throw her to the wolves. They KNEW what would happen. They're just trying to start shit at this point.

Also people saying that Gal Godot is prettier than Rachel Zegler so she has no reason to be jealous haven't watched the original Snow White film. Not to mention Gal Godot sure is RACIST enough to be jealous of biracial woman's looks.

[petr1kov]

the backlash peter dinklage got because of his comments about the dwarves in snow white still make no sense to me tbh. he was just asked about his thoughts on the movie on an interview and said that he finds absurd that stories like snow white are still uncritically being made today, where the 'dwarves' are portrayed as these quaint little fantasy creatures instead of just people with dwarfism, especially so because disney wants to push a progressive message in other regards. which is, frankly, a perfectly reasonable comment to make. then disney took that comment to heart and blew it out of proportion by saying that 'no no wait, we won't have dwarves like THAT in this movie, trust us guys' and decided to actually make them cgi creatures instead, likely to avoid facing controversy. so now everyone is mad at dinklage, accusing him of wanting to be the only actor with dwarfism with any fame and putting other seven actors out of a job, as if this one guy has any say in the decisions disney makes

[catgirl-kaiju]

okay, so i recently watched a god-awful movie from 1971 called "Horror of the Blood Monsters". while it contained some so-bad-it's good moments, it was mostly unbearable to watch. however, the parts that were the most interesting and entertaining, were colorized clips from a 1956 black-&-white Filipino english language film called "Tagani" (Alternatively called "Kahariang Bato" for the Tagalong release). I mean just look at this!

this looks so fun!

there's elaborate creature costuming that is really fun to see and at times fairly impressive for a low budget Filipino production in the 50s! i mean, just look at these sequences involving humanoid crab and bat creatures!

and there's a surprising amount of body diversity too! there are fat folks and a few actors with dwarfism who don't appear to be playing nonhuman roles!

so, i thought, i should find a copy of Tagani that i can watch since that's what i'd really like to be watching in the first place. but...

i can't fucking find it anywhere.

no uploads, no streaming, no home video releases, not even any indications of film reels being shown of it. what the fuck? where is Tagani??? have i stumbled into lost media?

the only indications of its existence are the footage in Horror of the Blood Monsters, a poster, and a trailer uploaded to youtube. i found links to the film uploaded to youtube when i searched on duckduckgo, but when i clicked on them, the uploads were gone! I was able to find a 1080p copy of HotBM, so in a just world, i would be able to find a 1080p copy of Tagani as well.

if anyone has this magnificent film archived or knows where i can go to find a copy of this, please let me know! i'd love to watch it and help preserve it! if you'd like to watch the Tagani segments in Horror of the Blood Monsters, i recommend skipping most of the portions involving the main cast of white american actors for the best experience. I do not recommend watching the full film as it's SO boring in most scenes. but the Tagani scenes never fail to entertain

[adorkastock]

Hello, good morning/afternoon/night! I've been trying to find dinamic posing references of people with dwarfism, but google always refers to fiction dwarves. Would you know where/how to look for better references? And, might I ask, would there be plans for the future for a model with dwarfism in the stock?

Hi there! I am not familiar with any models with dwarfism currently doing pose reference modeling. You could try looking up some photos of some well known actors and start with some studies there perhaps? I would certainly be interested in hiring someone with dwarfism to model for me, particularly someone with experience in acting, modeling, or cosplay. Maybe someone who sees this will be able to point you in a helpful direction in the replies or reblogs. ♥

[cherry-pop-elf]

Mouthwashing Actor AU

Jimmy: Jimmy Ray (a nod to him being named after a Lana Del Ray Song) Is a type cast where he’s the sweetest person to ever exist, but is extremely good at playing Villians. It be like that in the horror industry. He won’t lie though. Playing a role like this was his biggest challenge, as he would need to get into the head of a You Know What.

Curly: Curly Ray, aka Jimmy’s older brother. He was born Amelia (aka his limbs were never fully developed) and is often type casted to play monsters or characters that require a certain mobility. Much like how child/people will dwarfism play certain characters. He’s happy that he gets to play a normal person, even for a short while. (That would be explaining why we get very little screen time of Curly looking normal)

Anya: Anya Ray. She was originally Jimmy’s wife, but it was a case of lavender marriage. She needed to stay in the states to finish her schooling and he was terrified of coming out as gay. Fortunately Jimmy found his one true love and Anya ended up marrying Curly as they had bonded so much through the traumatic situation. She is a credited doctor who uses her knowledge to help make the medical scenes more real. Along with fellow actress. New to acting but not the acting society.

Daisuke: Daisuke Ray. Daisuke is the one who Jimmy fell for. He was a special effects/makeup artist (who specialized in horror) that was pretty much part of the team because of often working on whatever madness Curly would get dressed up as. He wasn’t originally meant to play a role in the show, but the director saw that all of them were extremely close and found it very important to have to convey real emotions and a sense of reality. So this is Daisukes first role, and by proxy he is rather hard to get into a serious mindset. It works in the end as his sweet and playful silly attitude leads to plenty of improve that conveys realism the director wants.

Swansea: Director Swan. He’s the one in charge of it all, and plays a role as well. More so as the background character (hence why we have more fleshing from everyone else compared to him) and wanted to convey an important and serious story. He’s a semi retired director, so he uses his time to make passion projects. That means he has more ability to follow what HE wants and not get swayed by other people’s PG needs. He saw how these four specific actors/special effects artists were already very close and it brought him the motivation to follow through on this latest passion project. Hence why they all use their real first names. A means to really hammer in this is a real story, with in its sci-fi elements.

[jaybear1701]

The thing I love most about Willow is that it’s a fun, light-hearted show that’s an homage to the original movie and others 80s fantasy films like the Princess Bride and Labyrinth -- but also subverts well-worn tropes and celebrates diversity to create something unique in a mainstream series. Like:

The quest launches to save a prince, not a princess.

Elora, initially in love with kidnapped Prince Airk, meets Graydon, another prince who is a POC and, based on what we’ve seen, everything Airk is not. I don’t really het ship, but the show seems to be leaning toward a Graylora “end game” and, if so, I’d love that for them.

The representation in this show is fantastic. Heroic roles traditionally reserved for men -- most typically white men -- are played by an actor with dwarfism, a British-Indian actor, an American-Guatemalan actor, and two mixed-race women. Not a stretch to say this is why some out there (we all know who) decry the show as “too woke.” But to me it’s one of the show’s many strengths. 

We’ve had many a narrative about a “chosen one.” But how often is the chosen one: 1) a woman and 2) whose “protector” is another woman, let alone a gay one. Amazing.

On that note, how refreshing is it to see such a layered relationship between Elora and Kit. There’s the push and pull of destiny and duty, and resentment and jealousy from family dynamics. But in the end it evolves into grudging respect and sisterhood. It’s the kind of dynamic normally reserved for two men in these types of genre shows. 

And Jade. My precious Jade. A woman knight of color protecting her princess is everything I’ve ever wanted in life. Tanthamore is Lancelot and Guinevere level romance -- but with lesbians. Come on. I cannot say enough about them. 

I’m sure there are more examples, but this is just off the top of my head. 

[alexanderwales]

I saw a post (which I cannot find now) which was about the casting of a Black woman as Elphaba in the new film version of Wicked, and pointing out that the musical is about discrimination, so this casting is a natural one.

But this seems ... kind of incorrect to me? That is, the musical has themes of personal identity, discrimination, prejudice, etc., but this is fantastical prejudice. So when, through casting or direction or acting choices or costuming or coding you pull some subtext (e.g. real-world prejudice) forward, you're changing the texture of the allegorical elements.

I don't think that this casting choice is wrong, I just don't find it to be "natural". It is a choice, and unlike a musical that was about nothing in particular, it's a choice that more meaningfully affects how the audience reads the musical. It makes the musical much less about prejudice generally, and much more about racial prejudice specifically. Maybe I'm being nit-picky about the word "natural" here, as though I think it's making a claim about what's in harmony with the work. Like "natural" means that someone is claiming the title of "most cohesive".

Imagine a version of Wicked where they cast a fat actor to play Elphaba. This obviously invites a different reading of the musical, right? Is this "less natural"? Is it "more natural"? I think it's a different choice to make, and I think people would be inclined to get different readings out of it.

This is the sort of thing that I sometimes have cause to think about, because I'm a writer, and have to decide on basic facts about characters, and figure out how those basic facts fit in with whatever kind of point (if any) I'm trying to hit.

If I wrote a story about how someone was kidnapped by aliens, and they think their human is just oh-so special, and this is maybe initially nice but it becomes clear that they just want the novelty human ... I would have choices for my human, right? And even if we keep all the dialog exactly the same, the readings become different if we're touching any kind of live wire. This would be a story about fetishism and exoticism and the way that makes a person feel like they're less of a person, or like they're only valuable for specific superficial traits.

So we could write our human to be an "everyman", nothing distinctive within the dominant culture. Or we could write our human to be someone with dwarfism. Or we could write our human to be an Asian woman. Or we could write our human to be transwoman. Or we could write our human to be an influencer. And all of these would substantially change our reading, right? The surface of the story wouldn't change, but the comparisons we invite would be different, and that changes the experience of the story, subconsciously or not. None of these are wrong, none are more natural, they're just choices.

[a-little-revolution]

What are your thoughts on Warwick Davis? He is a famous British actor with dwarfism. I loved him in Willow since it was my first exposure to him outside of the Hogwarts movies.

Hello! I have indeed discussed Warwick Davis on this blog! I absolutely adore him and his career, especially in Willow (1988) and his various roles in Harry Potter (though I no longer support J.K Rowling).

Like all Little actors, he's had to play some not so great roles, but for the most part Warwick has been a major talent within the fantasy genre. He is beloved in Hollywood and holds a special place in my heart!

[hopeymchope]

Snow White and the Seven Had-to-be-CGI Drarves

I don't understand all the bitching about the dwarves being CGI creations in the Snow White trailer. Like AT ALL.

Disney was beaten over the head with "You never, EVER should cast regular actors as little people/dwarves!" and THEN they got hit with "It's so insulting to cast real-life little people as mythical dwarves!" wave.

So they made the ONLY logical choice available to them.

Now, you can debate the visual designs and the finer details of how they handled these interpretations/adaptions of the characters, sure. But all this crying of "WHY ARE THEY CGI?!" is like... because there was no other fucking choice that they wouldn't get eaten alive for???

Well. There was the choice to NOT make another live-action remake of an animated Disney classic, but let's face it: That was never a valid choice with these people, because $$$$$$$$. When people finally stop going to see these goddamn things, maybe we can finally know peace on that front.

ETA:

@deepclover80 said this, and I thought... well shit, that's a really good point about actors with dwarfism.

Maybe the point here, then, is that Disney tried to take the only option that seemed to avoid controversy. And as it turns out? They failed. It's still going to be controversial. There was no "winning" this fight outside of not making the movie in the first place.

But at least this is a better controversy for the media to focus on than the"Rachel Zegeler isn't White" bullshit.

[wushigod]

The Harry Potter actor pays tribute to his “favourite human”, who died on 24 March, saying: “I miss her hugs.” “Her passing has left a huge hole in our lives as a family,” he added. Mrs Davis was also an actor, appearing alongside her husband in the final Harry Potter film in 2010, in which she played a goblin. The couple, who lived near Peterborough, met on the set of the film Willow in 1988, before marrying three years later. The Star Wars star described Sammy, as he called her, as his “most trusted confidante and an ardent supporter of everything I did in my career”. She was a unique character, always seeing the sunny side of life she had a wicked sense of humour and always laughed at my bad jokes,” he said. Davis said that with his wife by his side, he felt sure he could achieve anything, adding: “It was like having a super-power.” “Without Sammy, there would have been no Tenable quiz show, no Willow series. No Idiot Abroad Series 3.” He added it had been his wife who persuaded comedian Ricky Gervais to send him with Karl Pilkington for the travel series. The couple’s children, Harrison and Annabelle, joined their father in paying tribute, saying “her love and happiness carried us through our whole lives”. “Mum is our best friend and we’re honoured to have received a love like hers,” they added. Davis played both Professor Flitwick and the goblin Griphook in all eight films in the Harry Potter franchise. He also played several characters in the Star Wars film series, and starred in both the Willow film and the 2022 sequel. His wife’s other acting credits include the children’s series Through the Dragon’s Eye (1989). Outside of acting, Samantha Davis and her husband founded the charity Little People UK in 2012 to help individuals with dwarfism and their families. “She was passionate about helping people, without judgement. She had time for everyone and a genuine listening ear,” the Tenable host said. Davis said in recent years his wife’s mobility had become impaired but she was “determined that it would not impact her quality of life”. Disney, the network the Willow series was on, said Samantha was “beloved member of the UK film and TV community”, adding: “Our thoughts are with the Davis family during this difficult time”.

[sweetthoughtsbymarie]

October 11th

Tony Cox is an Actor who has Dwarfism lets take a look at Tony’s story. One of my favorite movies personally of Tony’s is Bad Santa 1 and 2. Tony was born March, 31st 1958. Tony’s form of dwarfism is Achondroplasia. This affects his bone growth in the limbs,spine, and skull. He has had challenges that he has been open about such as demeaning. He also said that competion for roles for the…

[sea-chest]

Remember when Mirror Mirror came out and hired actual Little People to play the dwarves (*cough* instead of cgi'ing other actors to have the proportions of Dwarfism *cough*) and also tied their Dwarfism into the plot and their characters?