"Succession" actor Brian Cox gave a blistering response when asked if actors should only take roles that match their identities and experiences.
"'B—s! Absolute b—s. Because it's the imagination," the Scottish actor said to BBC presenter Amol Rajan during a BBC 2 interview airing Thursday.
'It's again—what I talked about earlier on—about interfering with the imagination," Cox elaborated.
The BBC journalist brought up how British actress Helen Mirren was criticized for portraying former Prime Minister of Israel, Golda Meir, because she is not Jewish.
‘SUCCESSION’ ACTOR DEFENDS JK ROWLING FROM TRANSPHOBIA ACCUSATIONS
But Cox argued the point of acting was to show that "we can inhabit roles."
He also rejected the notion that there should be diversity quotas in films, suggesting they were dishonest.
"I think we have to be free of all that," he said according to The Daily Mail. "I think we have to be diverse but that's a different problem. But I don't think we have to say, ‘oh we have to gear it in that way,’ because we are not telling the truth. We have to tell the truth," he said.
Cox isn't the only one in Hollywood speaking out against diversity quotas and identity casting. "Jaws" actor Richard Dreyfuss recently slammed the Academy Awards for implementing new diversity and inclusion guidelines, saying the idea made him "vomit."
‘JAWS’ STAR RICHARD DREYFUSS BLASTS HOLLYWOOD INCLUSION STANDARDS: ‘THEY MAKE ME VOMIT’
The Academy said the criteria is meant to "encourage equitable representation on and off-screen" by ensuring more people of color fill positions on a film set from the starring role to interns and everything in between, as outlined in a press release published online. The guidelines apply to every film eligible for "Best Picture."
But Dreyfuss said that the rules would stifle creativity and risk-taking.
"And no one should be telling me, as an artist, that I have to give in to the latest most current idea of what morality is," he said on PBS.
Cox has also spoken out against cancel culture. He recently defended "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling saying she was being treated unfairly by critics. Rowling has been an outspoken opponent of transgender ideology.
"I don’t like the way she’s been treated, actually. I think she’s entitled to her opinion, she’s entitled to say what she feels," he said during a BBC News interview.
"As a woman, she’s very much entitled to say what she feels about her own body. There’s nobody better to say that, as a woman. So, I do feel that people have been a bit high and mighty about their own attitude toward J.K. Rowling, quite frankly," he added.
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Fox News' Gabriel Hays, Charles Creitz contributed to this report.