Sacha Baron Cohen to play Freddie Mercury in Queen film

[Perfect Stranger]

Hmmmmmmm.....I dunno! :nope

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/01718/sashaFreddie_1718258c.jpg

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/sacha-baron-cohen/8008694/Sacha-Baron-Cohen-to-play-Freddie-Mercury-in-Queen-film.html


I guess he'll be lipsyncing.... ;)

[R_of_G]

Does this picture help you?

http://www.superiorpics.com/wenn_album/Sacha_Baron_Cohen_-_Challenged/sacha_baron_cohen_001_110206.jpg

I think it's great casting. Cohen will do well in capturing Freddie's showmanship.

[marnold]

I have a hard time seeing him do a serious biopic.

[Pickngrin]

I have a hard time seeing him do a serious biopic.

I was thinking the same thing, Marnold, but I do think it is going to be a good performance.

[Katastrophe]

I'll bet he does a good job, as he gets waaaaaaaaaaaay deep into a character.

BUT... I'll have to reserve judgement until I see it, as the movie industry generally has a hard time doing rock n' roll films right.

This is Spinal Tap, on the other hand, was pure freaking cinematic genius.

[Eric]

BUT... I'll have to reserve judgement until I see it, as the movie industry generally has a hard time doing rock n' roll films right.
I once read something about music bios that talked about the difficulty actors have in portraying rock stars. It was something along the lines of "They have trouble pulling it off because they're not as cool as the rock stars. If they were, they wouldn't be acting -- they'd be rock stars."

I thought that summed it up rather well, albeit in an over-simplified way.

[Tig]

I guess he'll be lipsyncing.... ;)

Yep!

Come to think of it, I doubt there's a single human being that could sing like Freddie.
Anyone? Bueller?
Nope. Nada.

[kidsmoke]

who would'a thought Joaquin Pheonix could have nailed Johnny Cash like he did, or Jamie Foxx pulling off Ray Charles. Not me. I'm open to the possibility. Anybody would have to lip sync, though.

[R_of_G]

... as the movie industry generally has a hard time doing rock n' roll films right.

I think in large part, this has little to do with the actors and more to do with the direction/writing. Most of the recent crop of musician biopics all follow the same basic formula...

Young musician works hard to develop his style > Young musician hits it big > Now-successful musician gets hooked on drugs/alcohol and reaches rock bottom > credits roll as rest of career is overlooked.

Ray and Walk the Line are the best examples. Fox and Phoenix both gave good performances, but the scripts seemed to ignore the fact that Charles and Cash had lengthy careers following their problematic experiences.