Universal Pictures International Apologizes to Laverne Cox Over ‘Promising Young Woman’ Dubbing

Haley Bosselman
·2 min read
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Universal Pictures International has apologized to Laverne Cox for giving her a male voice in the Italian-language version of “Promising Young Woman.”

“We are deeply grateful to Laverne and the transgender community for opening our eyes to a bias that neither we nor many in our industry had recognized,” a spokesperson from Universal Pictures International said in a statement. “While there was no malicious intent behind this mistake, we are working diligently to fix it. We have begun redubbing Ms Cox’s voice with female actors in our international territories and are pushing back release dates to ensure the correct version is available. We are sorry for the pain caused but are thankful that we can address the situation on this film and prevent similar mistakes from happening again on future projects.”

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Emerald Fennell’s Academy Award-winning movie was scheduled to release in Italy on May 13, but has since been pushed back after Universal Pictures Italy posted a clip of “Una Donna Promettente” on May 6. The now restricted video features Carey Mulligan’s Cassie chatting with Gail, her coffee shop boss and lone friend played by Cox. Her clearly masculine tone, voiced by actor Roberto Pedicini, prompted outage on social media from Italian viewers.

Voice actor Vittoria Schisano — who previously dubbed Cox on Netflix’s “Amend: The Fight for America” and was the Italian voice behind “Big Mouth’s” trans character Natalie — revealed to The Guardian that she doesn’t know know any other trans voice actors in Italy and wasn’t asked to read for Cox’s role in “Promising Young Woman.”

Universal moved forward with casting a cis male actor to dub Cox’s character after having done so in the past for roles such as in “Orange is the New Black.” Cis men were also cast for the versions released in Spain, which released in April, and Germany, which has pushed back the release to re-dub with a woman’s voice like in Italy. In Spain, the home entertainment release will be re-dubbed with a female voice.

Cox not commented on the film’s dubbing.

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