James Bond star Ben Whishaw is Queen’s choice to play Freddie Mercury in an upcoming biopic of the rock icon.
Speaking on the BBC’s One Show, Queen drummer Roger Taylor said that the actor the band wanted had the initials “BW”, and when asked if that meant Whishaw, he replied: “Well, we hope so.”
The news comes after guitarist Brian May explained the reasons why Sacha Baron Cohen, the actor originally attached to play Mercury, was no longer involved in the project.
Talking to Classic Rock magazine, May said “we felt that his presence in the movie would be very distracting”.
“What led us to that conclusion was the last three movies that [Baron Cohen has] made – The Dictator, Les Miserables and Hugo – in which he makes outstanding performances, but they’re very much Sacha Baron Cohen performances,” May said.
“And we thought there has to be no distraction in the Freddie movie. You have to really suspend that disbelief – the man who plays Freddie, you have to really believe is Freddie. And we didn’t that could really happen with Sacha.”
Whishaw, who played Q in the recent 007 filmSkyfall, becomes the latest name associated with the high profile role since Baron Cohen’s departure – others included Daniel Radcliffe and Dominic Cooper.
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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