Let me start to say that I have really enjoyed the current adaptation of les miserables by the BBC. Beautiful colours, scenery, script, a classic social story and of course good actors. What I do not enjoy are the contributions by what I have to describe as the race police. Les miserables is a story, written in a time when racial diversity was less then it is now. But to portray this story in this time with the actors we now have it would be strange to cast actors on basis of racial attributes dating back two centuries.
It would be equally strange to defend the choice of actors for certain characters by explaining Javert could have been Haitian as there were some Haitians in France at that time, but then you would have to argue why Javert could be from Haiti, but not Valjean, which discussion to me seems even more nonsensical.
Reading some of the contributions some people seem to think that a cast must not only mention actors skills but also race, but I do not agree. I think the public is well informed enough to look past these casting choices as long as the acting is top notch.
In opera we see German women play Chinese princesses in Turandot, I even saw an Afro-American Brunhilde and why not, as long as the performance does not suffer.
Coming back to Les Miserables, I like how Valjean and Fantine are played, I have some trouble with Javert though, maybe more because of the character than the way he is portrayed. His motivation is explained, but his actions are not always so clear cut to me, but maybe I'm missing something as it is only the second episode.
