Queen guitarist Brian May has confirmed that a Freddie Mercury biopic will hit theaters in 2014, with renowned comedian Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat, Da Ali G Show) set to play the lead role.
May, who first announced plans for the film in September 2010, gave an update on its progress in a post on his official website: “I promised news of yesterday’s Queen band meeting. Well, it was just Roger and Jim Beach and myself … Our main agenda was the Freddie film … which, I’m happy to tell you, is on course.”
He continued: “The pieces are all falling into place, though we are now on a slightly later schedule – filming is now scheduled to start in the Spring, with Sacha Baron Cohen playing Freddie. The film should be ready for release early in 2014.”
The biopic will tell the story of the late Queen singer’s formative years leading up to the group’s legendary 1985 Live Aid performance. Oscar-nominated screenwriter Peter Morgan, who was behind ‘The Queen’ and ‘Frost/Nixon’ screenplays, will pen the script and the film is being co-produced by Robert DeNiro’s TriBeCa Productions.
May said that the band would be making more announcements shortly: “We did make some other plans, but they will have to stay under wraps for now. Being in Queen is – bizarrely – as full of surprising twists and turns as ever – 40 years since we first got together, and 20 years after losing Freddie. But of course Freddie is in so many ways very much alive. He must be wryly smiling somewhere !!!”
Comments 0