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I am in pain and having some trouble sleeping. So I want to rewrite an idea I had a little while ago.

I would, as a reaction to shows such as "Gossip Girl", love to see a film taking the life story of the Buddha and setting it in the modern day, because I feel as if it would not only provide a chance for a unique adaptation but also help to cram some of his message down people's throats.

(Honestly, I personally would be more interested in creating a film about Buddha set in the correct historical time period because of the the beauty of the land and architecture that could be filmed and because I would be interested in researching the aesthetic groups he was involved in before his enlightenment. This film would probably be grittier, though it certainly could be beautiful.)

But anyways, this made me think at the time I had the idea, "Would people be fine with a Caucasian actor in NY playing Gautama Buddha?"

I didn't and don't think so. My reasoning is that I don't think people would be able to accept a white Buddha anymore than an Indian Jesus Christ or a black Confucius. My personal feeling on the matter is that such stories transcend race and time, but the possessiveness cultures feel about their central figures is not to be taken lightly. Of course, Jesus and Buddha have both already taken on alternate iconography in the cultures their religions/philosophy has spread to. Will new iconographies, even in a nonreligious sense, be accepted or tolerated in the world today on a mainstream level? The truth of the matter is that they spring up all the time in microcultures, but could they also tolerate exposure outside of them? This is a different topic, of course.

A culture generally has a large part of its identity based on these iconic figures. I somehow get the impression that the general audience would consider it "theft" of one of their central stories. Of course, adaptations have generally never destabilized the original culture or figure, but the artistic choice by a single person may be looked down upon for this reason(which I don't agree with). I also get the impression, in the case of India, that there are still hard feelings over England taking over the country, which would worsen this feeling of theft.

Part of the problem I have with this notion of theft is that it equates culture with race. If you are representing these figure's symbolic life story, they are just serving as that-symbols which everyone should be able to share a part of, no matter where they originated.

This is a long question and topic, and I feel as if I finally am going to be able to sleep. I may return to this tomorrow, or some other time, for some mental exercise.