Wednesday, January 27, 2016

The Glamorous 9/11 Movie We Been Waiting For

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In the wake of his enormous success with Shakespeare in Love I really thought Joseph Fiennes would go somewhere, but I didn't expect that somewhere to be "right off the face of the Earth." Within three years he was doing straight-to-video-ish dreck like Killing Me Softly with Heather Graham (although bless him he was awfully naked in that). He would pop up here (Running With Scissors) and there (American Horror Story - okay clearly Ryan Murphy loves him) but mostly it's been a bit of a disappearing act. (Do you think he offended Gywneth in some way? She is powerful, vengeful.)

Anyway today there is very exciting and strange news regarding the other Mr. Fiennes -- he is going to play... Michael Jackson??? Yes, that Michael Jackson. And you know what, it's actually kind of great casting? Or it could be anyway with the right make-up, for we're talking Michael Jackson in 2001...

Maybe I'm crazy but I can see it. Anyway it will clearly need a lot of make-up (and shaving, constant shaving) to get there. But that aside, everything else about this project screams "YES YES YES" a million times -- it's based on that legendary Vanity Fair article from a few years back that told the tale of how Michael Jackson, Elizabeth Taylor, and Marlon Brando were forced to take a road trip together in the wake of 9/11 when all the flights out of New York were grounded. They were planning on driving all the way to California, but they only made it to Cincinnati.

To top all of this off, playing Elizabeth Taylor in the tele-film (it's being made for the British TV channel Sky) is Stockard Channing (YES YES YES) and playing Brando is Brian Cox (YES YES YES). Can you imagine? I don't understand why this is only a TV Movie -- they should be spending a hundred million dollars on this thing.
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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Stockard Channing is brilliant casting. Maybe she and Helena Bpnham Carter can have a Liz-off?