Danny Ramirez Twelve Times

It's been about 77 weeks since Joaquin Phoenix bitched out of Todd Haynes' gay romance film De Noche in August of 2024 -- that's 77 weeks of one of our greatest living filmmakers' time and output gone, just gone, so let's take a fresh moment to mourn it (all while cursing Joaquin's name under our breath) (or even over our breath). Okay -- better news, better mood, today Variety has officially confirmed the rumor floating about since last summer; that Joaquin's Eddington co-star Pedro Pascal is indeed taking over the abandoned role opposite Danny Ramirez (who bless him has kept himself tightly attached this entire time) and shooting will kick off next month. It's been so very long since all of this began -- did I mention seventy-seven weeks? And that was just the moment the project fell apart; there were months of speculation before that -- that I think I should re-share the plot of the film:

"The story, which echoes classic noirs like “Chinatown,” charts the passionate and unexpected love affair between a cop (Pascal) and a boarding school teacher (Ramirez) in 1930s Los Angeles, when the city is overtaken by corruption and the world is on the brink of war. The two men become targets of the city’s corrupt political machine and are forced to flee to Mexico."

Sounds killer! (No I am not punning on Todd's longstanding relationship with Killer Films, although that's bonus points.) But seriously we love Haynes doing period films and 1930s Noir-tinged L.A. is certainly new for him -- I'll admit I'm detecting a few notes of Luca Guadagnino's ex-pat age-gap homosexual paean Queer in that description (especially their venture south of the border) but as much as I love Queer I have not a single doubt that Haynes will do his own wonderful thing. Break a (Joaquin's) leg(s), Todd! And now in celebration of this news, an older but never-here-posted Danny photoshoot (via) I will share with you after the jump...