Dan Stulbach

Dan Stulbach, the actor, was born in Brazil in 1969.  He graduated in Social Communication at the Higher School of Advertising and Marketing in Sao Paulo.  There, Dan created a theater group from which he directed shows.  

Later, he lived in San Diego and New York studying English and taking advantage of opportunities to see movies and plays.  Dan bears a resemblance to the American actor Tom Hanks.

I first saw him in the Brazilian telenovela, Mulheres Apaixonades (Women in Love), where Dan portrayed Marcos, a man who occasionally beat his wife with a tennis racquet.

Several months ago, we learned that Dan had rented an apartment in our building in Sao Paulo.  Cristina and I were anxious see the celebrity in our midst.  I saw him a couple of times.

Last month I was standing by the elevator in the building's garage waiting for Cristina to park the car when a man approached me.  I told him in Portuguese that I was waiting for my wife.  He noticed my foreign accent and asked me where I was from.  I asked him where he thought I was from.  He guessed Germany.  I corrected him.  

When Cristina arrived, she engaged the man in an extended conversation.  When she finally entered the elevator with me, I asked whom she was talking to.  Dan Stulbach.  I had not recognized him in the somewhat darkened garage.

The very next day, Cristina and I were on our way to our local cinema to see the film, Ainda Estou Aqui (I'm Still Here) starring Fernanda Torres.  On the steps in front of our building, we ran into Dan again.  

This time we engaged in a conversation with him in both Portuguese and English.  It turns out all three of us saw Tom Hanks in his Broadway play, Lucky Guy.  Dan got a chance to briefly meet Tom backstage.

Very soon after the movie started we were shocked to see our new friend Dan was in Ainda Estou Aqui as a family friend (Baby) of the protagonist (Eunice).  When does that ever happen...to see a person on the street...and then in a movie on the same day?

Very recently at the Golden Globe's award show, Fernanda Torres won the Best Actress Award in a Drama.  I thought of the scene she had, one on one, with our friend, Dan Stulbach.  

    

Mrs. Tootsie Doubtfire

Tootsie is a 1982 American satirical romantic comedy film directed by Sydney Pollack.  It stars Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Teri Garr, Dabney Coleman, Charles Durning, Bill Murray and Geena Davis. 

In the film, Michael (Hoffman) is a talented actor with a reputation for being professionally difficult to work with.  In order to get a job acting, he adopts a female persona (Tootsie), the opposite of his male persona.

Mrs. Doubtfire is a 1993 comedy.  It stars Robin Williams, Sally Field and Pierce Brosnan.  

In the film, Daniel (Williams) is being divorced by his wife (Field).  As a devoted father, he yearns to remain close to his children.  Because of this, Daniel adopts a female persona (Mrs. Doubtfire) and lands the job as his children's nanny.

Neither Tootsie nor Mrs. Doubtfire were actually female.  They simply adopted a female role, both acting and dressing as such.  During the Twentieth Century, such people were referred to as transvestites, now replaced by the term transgender.

From 2014 to 2015, Rachel Dolezal was the president of a local chapter of the NAACP (Spokane, WA).  In spite of the fact that both of her parents were White, Rachel "identified as a Black woman."

Rachel was forced to resign as president.  Apparently, you can't simply identify as Black...you must be Black.

William Thomas was born male in 1999.  In 2019, he decided to identify as a woman and adopted the name Lia Thomas.  Lia then switched from the men's swimming team (at the University of Pennsylvania) to the women's swimming team.  

William/Lia went from being a mediocre swimmer on the men's team to a NCAA champion on the women's team.  Apparently, you can simply identify as a woman (transgender) to compete as a woman...even if you are a biological male, with all its advantages.