It happens so often in historic movies, but whoever thought that it would happen with “The King Of Pop” Michael Jackson?

Actor Joseph Fiennes, who is white, is reportedly set to play the late pop icon in a movie with the backstory set right after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

The 45 year old Fiennes will star in the Sky Arts television movie that follows the singer’s attempt to get home from New York City after the attacks. According to a well known Hollywood insider story, Michael took a road trip with Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando following 9/11 and they got all the way to Ohio in a rental car. The film will be based on the Vanity Fair piece which tells about the road trip.

How important is it for biopics to match ethnicities between the subject and the actor/actress portraying his or her role?