News > First Pic from Ben Stiller's Tropic Thunder

Entertainment Weekly put up a First Look picture from Tropic Thunder today.  Here it is.

That's Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr, and Jack Black.

Yes, that is Robert "Iron Man" Downey Jr and there is an explanation.

Tropic Thunder is an epic action comedy co-written and directed by Ben Stiller.  It is meant to be a lampoon of insufferable actors and has a good cast in place to do just that.

The plot follows "a team of self-indulgent stars cast in the modern equivalent of Apocalypse Now… but when the film's director (Steve Coogan) and writer (Nick Nolte) get fed up with their prima donna cast, they drop them into the jungle to fend for themselves. The actors think they're doing some sort of full-immersion filmmaking, but the danger they're in is very real." 

The Actors:

* Ben Stiller plays an action hero who has just adopted a baby from Asia but worries that ''all the good ones are gone.''

* Robert Downey Jr. plays Kirk Lazarus, a very serious Oscar-winning actor cast in the most expensive Vietnam war epic ever filmed.  His Sgt. Osiris role in the film was originally written as black, so he dyes his skin for authenticity. 

* A blonde Jack Black portrays a comedian known for performing multiple roles in a single film — his latest is called The Fatties: Fart 2.

There is some worry about backlash resulting from having a white actor playing a black character, but it's not a role he stole from a black actor.  Downey makes a good point: "If it's done right, it could be the type of role you called Peter Sellers to do 35 years ago. If you don't do it right, we're going to hell." 

It's a solid cast and if the script is up to par, this could be the funniest comedy of the summer.  Tropic Thunder opens on August 15.