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Posts tagged as biopics

biopic

Forest Whitaker Is Producing the Richard Pryor Biopic and Starting from Scratch

by | March 28th, 2013

Forest Whitaker has signed on as a producer, taking over development of the biopic of influential stand-up Richard Pryor, Deadline reports. A movie about Pryor's life has been in development since 1995, with everyone from Damon Wayans to Eddie Griffin, Mike Epps to Eddie Murphy, and Chris Rock to director Martin Scorsese being involved at one point or another. Most recently, filmmaker Bill Condon (Dreamgirls) was onboard to direct the movie with Marlon Wayans playing Pryor, but Condon put the project on hold in 2010 to direct the Twilight sequels Breaking Dawn Parts 1 and 2. Forest Whitaker will be developing a new script, with input from Richard [...]

Biopics

The Trouble with Comedian Biopics

by | April 25th, 2011

Biopics are a Hollywood mainstay, with films based upon an inspiring public figure's life being a tried-and-true path for stars and filmmakers to gain prestige during awards season. The most common are films about musicians (Walk the Line, Ray), but those based on political figures (Milk, The King's Speech) and media moguls (The Aviator, The Social Network) also pop up in cineplexes with regularity. Films focusing on comedians are all the more rare, but a small handful been produced, to varying results. With biographical films about Richard Pryor, John Belushi, and Sam Kinison in the early stages of development, now seems an appropriate time to evaluate the state of [...]

Biopics

There Are Two Dueling Del Close Biopics in Development

by | March 19th, 2013

There's been a lot of hubbub in the press lately about two competing Steve Jobs biopics, but now, The Chicago Tribune reports that there are two dueling movies based on the life of Del Close, the father of modern improvisational comedy. Close, amongst other things, trained dozens of well-known comedians like Bill Murray, John Belushi, Chris Farley, Tina Fey, Stephen Colbert, and Amy Poehler at Chicago's Second City and ImprovOlympic theaters from the early '70s up until his death in 1999. Here's the info on the two similar movies, one called Guru from the Second City camp and another called Del from the ImprovOlympic camp:

Guru - Produced by Second [...]

Casting

Eddie Murphy Gets Serious With Spike Lee's Marion Barry Biopic

by | December 9th, 2011

Eddie Murphy might finally be making good on that whole "I'm not gonna do dumb family movies anymore. Except for this one. (Also I'm hosting the Oscars, except that I'm not)" thing. He's going for a serious role this time, signing on to play disgraced former D.C. mayor Marion Barry in Spike Lee's biopic in development for HBO Films. Murphy hasn't had a big dramatic role in…ever, unless you count Dreamgirls, so this should be cool, especially if you're into smoking crack with prostitutes. I mean, watching movies about smoking crack with prostitutes. Right.

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