'Why Are You Hiring Snow White And The Seven Average People?': Jason 'Wee Man' Acuña Blasts Disney's 'Snow White,' 'Wonka' For Eliminating Roles For 'Dwarfs'

Jason Acuña, known to a generation of 'Jackass' viewers as "Wee Man," publicly offered scathing criticism of both Disney's upcoming 'Snow White,' and Warner Bros. 'Wonka' for casting averagely proportioned actors and actresses as characters explicitly written and previously portrayed on film as dwarfs.

Acuña blasted Disney's politically driven casting decision prompted by the objections of fellow actor Peter Dinklage whose criticism of casting little people as dwarfs led the studio to recast the titular "Seven Dwarfs," in its live-action reimagining of Walt Disney's 1937 classic.

He also mocked the casting of British actor Hugh Grant, who reportedly stands at approximately 5'10" according to IMDB, and had to be resized through CGI to portray an Oompa Loompa in "Wonka" the upcoming film based upon Roald Dahl’s classic novel, "Charlie and The Chocolate Factory."

The orange-faced, diminutive, and musically apt workers in Wonka's factory have been traditionally presented as about half the average height of an adult and have been portrayed by little people since Paramount Pictures' 1971 "Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory." Most recently in the Warner Bros. 2005 production of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," the role was played by a digitally duplicated stuntman, actor, and puppeteering legend Gurdeep Roy, known by his stage name "Deep Roy" who stands at 4'4". 

While few could criticize Roy's herculean effort to portray 165 different Oompa Loompas through animation reference shots in the 2005 production, even then many criticized the move as costing actors with dwarfism a potentially lucrative opportunity. 

Likewise, Fox News reported that Acuña called out Disney, saying, 

"You’re replacing jobs that people could have [us] as little people. It’s for dwarfs. Why are you hiring ‘Snow White and the seven average people?"

He urged Disney to "make it better," and "re-do" the casting with members of the dwarfism community portraying the characters. 

Addressing Hugh Grant's upcoming role, he said, "Hugh Grant is now playing an Oompa Loompa? So I guess Hugh Grant, you’re now identifying as a little person?" he asked sarcastically, in a clip posted to TikTok "Huh, interesting."

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Jackass star Wee Man criticizes the casting of Hugh Grant in Wonka

♬ original sound - Movie Maniacs

In 2022, Dinklage, whose 2003 breakout role in Jon Favreu's "Elf" starring Will Ferrell eventually led to his career-making role as Tyrion Lannister in all 8 seasons of "Game of Thrones," publicly complained that Disney was "progressive in one way, but then you’re still making that f---ing backwards story about seven dwarfs living in a cave together, what the f--- are you doing, man?" on Marc Maron’s “WTF” podcast. 

A spokesman from Disney subsequently told Deadline, “To avoid reinforcing stereotypes from the original animated film, we are taking a different approach with these seven characters and have been consulting with members of the dwarfism community. We look forward to sharing more as the film heads into production after a lengthy development period.” The result was a single little person actor with six others of average height being cast as the "seven magical creatures."

Many users on X App (formerly Twitter) suggested a raft of possible actors to portray the classic dwarfs for Disney including, Dinklage himself, alongside Acuña and other famed actors in the dwarfism community such as Warwick Davis, Tony Cox, Brad Williams, Michael J Anderson and Phil Fondacaro as Doc, Sleepy, Dopey, Grumpy, Happy, Bashful and Sneezy (although not in that order.)

Warner Bros. has not commented on its choice to cast Grant as an Oompa Loompa as of this report.