David Suchet profits from an industry that sees straight white people as the bankable norm. No wonder he finds representation tiresome

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On the set of the 1976 thriller Marathon Man, Laurence Olivier is said to have asked Dustin Hoffman, a devotee of method acting who had stayed awake for three days to get into the mindset of a character driven mad by sleeplessness, “My dear boy, why don’t you just try acting?” Just as it is the job of a lorry driver to drive lorries and a furniture designer to design furniture, it is, of course, the job of an actor to act. But over the past year the role of actors, specifically who they should and shouldn’t play, has been called into question by an industry grappling with concepts of inclusivity, authenticity and identity.

Having been pressured to bow out of a project in which she was to play a trans character, a disgruntled Scarlett Johansson stated in July that “as an actor I should be allowed to play any person, or any tree, or any animal because that is my job and the requirements of my job”. Later, in a clarifying statement, she added: “Art in all forms should be immune to political correctness.”

Reigniting the casting debate this week was the Poirot actor David Suchet, who, in citing the case of a Hollywood actor removed from the role of Shylock in The Merchant of Venice for not being Jewish, told an interviewer: “That upset me. Does that mean you have to be Jewish to play Shylock? How far does this go? I’m concerned. Will only a Belgian be allowed to play Poirot, eventually?”

It’s worth noting that this is the same David Suchet that played Caliban in an RSC version of The Tempest in 1978 in black-face, and, in 1983, wore special makeup on his eyes in order to play a Chinese man in the television series Reilly, Ace of Spies. Those were different times, of course, though, even now, Suchet maintains: “I don’t want who I can play to become small because of political correctness.”

There is, naturally, truth in Suchet and Johansson’s assertions that an actor’s job is not simply to duplicate themselves and their life experience (a sentiment that echoed Cate Blanchett’s declaration last year that she “would fight to the death for the right to suspend disbelief and play roles beyond my experience”), not least because that would leave superhero and fantasy genres in a bind. To insist on such restrictions would also mean we would have to demand that the heterosexual Olivia Colman return her Oscar for playing the bisexual queen in The Favourite, and that the straight actor Rami Malek hand in his gong for his turn as Queen’s Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody.

Still, it’s wearying to find both Suchet and Johansson invoking the old political correctness chestnut to articulate their displeasure, suggesting as it does irrationality on the part of those who might disagree. Substitute “political correctness” for “things that prevent me from doing what I want” and a clearer picture begins to emerge. The future of art may hang in the balance but, going on their respective statements, it’s their own access to parts that seems to worry them most.

While the issue of authenticity warrants consideration ­– there is undeniable power in marginalised or misrepresented people controlling their narratives and telling their own stories – to demand personal investment in every role is patently daft, not to say unworkable. The real issue here is opportunity. Throughout their careers, Suchet and Johansson have been allowed to apply their considerable skills to a panoply of characters from all walks of life, a luxury not always extended to LGBT+ actors, people of colour or indeed older women deemed by the industry to be past their sell-by dates. These are the groups facing discrimination from producers and casting directors, and who are most likely to be passed over for younger, whiter, straighter models.

When the actor Darren Criss won an Emmy for his performance as a gay serial killer in the TV series The Assassination of Gianni Versace, he announced it would be his last gay part on the basis that he didn’t want to be “another straight boy taking a gay man’s role”. Naturally, one heterosexual man nobly relinquishing a gay role isn’t going to redress the balance any more than one Jewish man playing Shylock is. But these are nonetheless small steps to achieving a situation in which discrimination is a thing of the past.

None of this is to say there is no room for invention and imagination in acting. Yet it’s a clear lack of imagination on the part of the industry that views minority actors as outliers, a risk to an already financially perilous enterprise, and straight white people as the bankable norm. When the likes of Suchet and Johansson argue that any actor should be able to play anyone – or anything – it's a measure of the privilege they enjoy. To them, efforts towards representation and inclusivity seem tiresome rather than necessary. But then it’s not their livelihoods on the line.