Who should have been cast in the notoriously bad 1990 movie version of Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities? These suggestions all assume it's 1990, although pop culture history since then is assumed:
Sherman McCoy (played by Tom Hanks): William Hurt or Steve Martin (Hanks is too likable, lacks WASP hauteur)
Self-hating English tabloid journalist Peter Fallow (played by Bruce Willis; character based on Anthony Haden-Guest): Christopher Guest (half-brother of Haden-Guest), Richard E. Grant, or Hugh Grant
Judge Myron "Jewish Warrior" Kovitsky (played by Morgan Freeman in the movie; based on Judge Burton B. Roberts): Alan Arkin
Kramer the hapless Assistant DA (played by Saul Rubinek): Jason Alexander
Rev. Bacon (John Hancock; based on Al Sharpton): Eddie Murphy
Killian (Kevin Dunn; based on streetwise NYC criminal attorney Eddie Hayes): Mickey Rourke, Alec Baldwin, or Dennis Leary
Detectives (Barton Heyman and Norton Parker): Jerry Orbach and Chris Noth
Elderly Albert Vogel (not in movie; based on hustling radical lawyer William Kunstler): Rodney Dangerfield
District Attorney Abe Weiss (F. Murray Abraham): Dustin Hoffman, Michael Lerner (studio mogul in Barton Fink)
District Attorney Abe Weiss (F. Murray Abraham): Dustin Hoffman, Michael Lerner (studio mogul in Barton Fink)
Tall, rawboned, explosively crazy prisoner (not in movie; based presumably on Hunter S. Thompson): Michael Richard
The Mayor (not in movie; based on Ed Koch): Mayor Ed Koch
McCoy's wife and girlfriend (Kim Cattrall and Melanie Griffith): I don't know, but not Kim Cattrall and/or Melanie Griffith
And you can do the same exercise for a hypothetical 2013 remake.
And you can do the same exercise for a hypothetical 2013 remake.
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74 comments:
Even in 1990 William Hurt was too old to be Sherman McCoy. You wanted a young WASP/Yuppie the audience was primed to hate - someone like Christian Bale, if he'd been the right age.
Not sure who could've played Killian, but he could just as easily been changed to an Italian.
Hugh Grant would've been just right for the English journalist, though Jude Law would've been perfect if he'd been the right age.
The judge from Picket Fences for Kovitsky.
When I thought of Kramer I sort of pictured a beefier, slightly higher testosterone version of Sam Lloyd, the hapless lawyer from "Scrubs."
And I'd almost bet that Al Sharpton would've loved to have played a fictional version of himself. Give him enough money and he wouldn't mind the self-mockery. If not him then maybe Don King.
That's a movie that should be remade, perhaps as an HBO miniseries. The best movies to remake are the ones that weren't made right the first time.
~Risto
Okay, Ving Rhames was a good Don King about a dozen years ago in an HBO biopic, so Ving Rhames is a good cheaper alternative to Eddie Murphy.
One thing to keep in mind is that Rev. Bacon in the book is colder than Rev. Sharpton, but that may be a flaw in the book.
"Even in 1990 William Hurt was too old to be Sherman McCoy"
Hurt was born in 1950. Sherman McCoy was supposed to be something like 38. Hurt had one Oscar and two other nominations by that point, but only one since then as he fell out of favor with the industry (drinking? irascibility?). He was still a big star in 1990, though.
Hurt is the step-grandson of Henry Luce, founder of Time-Life.
He was still a big star in 1990, though.
Don't think so. His last big hit at that point was Accidental Tourist, which was a critical success but not sure it made much money.
I think Hurt's career as a movie star was a fluke, based on his appealing coldness in The Big Chill. Most of his other big hits haven't aged well: Kiss of the Spider Woman, Children of a Lesser God, Gorky Park, and aforementioned AT. I always thought he was miscast in Broadcast News--you can call him many things, but you can't call him stupid.
Why not Kevin Bacon for McCoy? He played the spoiled rich guy in Diner,would have just scored relatively big in Flatliners and made one of the best B movies of all time (Tremors).
Hurt seems older than he is, and I'm not sure he would've been Yuppie enough. I thought he was 40 in "Broadcast News," and that was 1988. Jason Alexander is probably too short to be Kramer, but perhaps.
And yeah, I really hope they remake it. You hafta wonder who the hell came up with those casting choices.
Saul Rubinek was GREAT as the villainous "Jason" on "the Equalizer" so no dissing the guy from "Warehouse 13."
Replace Tom Hanks with say, Patrick Swayze, you've got a different movie. Yeah, I know, the guy made a ton of bad 80's movies. But he could play All-American in way that Hanks, Mr. Loveable wanting to be Loved, could not.
Why not Swayze?
"I always thought he was miscast in Broadcast News--you can call him many things, but you can't call him stupid."
Nah, Hurt was perfect in "Broadcast News."
Hurt tried to secure the rights to "A River Runs Through It," but supposedly his assistant pissed off Norman Maclean by insisting Hurt didn't need a fishing license because he was a big star. I imagine Hurt would've done far better with it than Robby Redford.
"I think Hurt's career as a movie star was a fluke, based on his appealing coldness in The Big Chill."
OK, but appealing coldness is about what you want in a Sherman McCoy, who isn't particularly likable or interesting. Put him in a time machine, and today's Ben Affleck would have made an okay Sherman McCoy. Hanks could have been fine in the role if the rest of the movie was better.
By the way, there's nothing novel about suggesting William Hurt for the role. He was the most widespread assumption after the book came out, with Steve Martin as the riskier choice.
The problem with Hanks was that he signified that the filmmakers had gone off track by deciding to make it a movie about a yuppie. There's a scene in the book where Sherman McCoy and another of his Old Money friends are making fun of slightly younger, less established yuppies for wearing yellow ties, which they see as the calling card of yuppies. So, first thing you see in the movie is Tom Hanks, who looks about 5-10 years too young and too middle class ... wearing a yellow tie (warning: haven't seen the movie in 22 years so may have this all wrong).
Lol, Rodney Dangerfield playing William Knutsler.
In general, the idea of making a 2 hour movie out of Bonfire of the Vanities was always pretty hopeless. The screenwriter was a guy who had done a pretty good job movie-izing John Updike's The Witches of Eastwick, so maybe they figured he had some magic in him. I don't know. There's a book about the making of the movie that I haven't read.
McCoy is supposed to be the kind of dull centerpiece to all the crazy supporting characters, That's not really that hard to pull off, but the movie tried to turn that inside out by casting likable Tom Hanks as McCoy and likable Bruce Willis as his nemesis Fallow and likable Morgan Freeman as the judge. That's a lot of starpower wasted on a fundamental misconception.
I am sick of Tom Hanks.
O/T sorry folks!
One for the, oh-so-rare, fake hate crime files:
KKK attack - not!
William Hurt would certainly have looked right as McCoy, but would he have been willing to play him as written in the book -- i.e., as sort of a dull snob? Hurt did a great job playing a smart, passionate scientist in the great Altered States. He would have had to go in the opposite direction as McCoy.
Most of your other suggestions are on the money too, with a couple of exceptions:
- Jason Alexander wouldn't work as the assistant DA Kramer, unless you were making the movie a farce. In the book, Kramer lifts weights and likes to throw his head back at a certain angle to show off his neck muscles. He's a pathetic character, but unlike Alexander's George Constanza, Kramer is not in on the joke.
- Better than Eddie Murphy as Rev. Bacon would have been Carl Weathers. Bacon is a rabble rouser like Sharpton, but he is a leading man version of Sharpton: Wolfe describes him as athletic, impeccably dressed, and he's written as being savvier about navigating the establishment than Sharpton, e.g., Bacon has the minority set-aside muni bond underwriting scam with McCoy's bond firm, Pierce & Pierce.
As for McCoy's mistress, how about what's-her-name, Rosanna Arquette's younger sister?
"Notoriously bad"?
I'd say it's beneath mention. I dislike even having this maladaptation cross my mind.
Suggested casting:
Sherman McCoy: Kevin Spacey
Peter Fallow: Nickolas Grace (who in the superb late 1970's TV series of 'Brideshead Revisited' aced his portrayal of homosexual sybarite Anthony Blanche), or Jeremy Irons, or Malcolm McDowell
Judge Myron Kovitsky: Nehemiah Persoff
Kramer the hapless Assistant DA: Bob Balaban, David Hyde-Pierce
Rev. Bacon: Keith David, Forest Whitaker (if you can play Idi Amin, you can play Rev. Bacon)
Killian - attorney: Robert Duval
Detectives: Ray Liotta & Kevin Dillon
Albert Vogel (not in movie; based on radical lawyer William Kunstler): Geoffrey Rush
District Attorney Abe Weiss: Richard Dreyfuss
Tall, rawboned, explosively crazy prisoner (not in movie; based presumably on Hunter S. Thompson): Woody Harrelson, or Willem Dafoe, or John C. McGinley
The Mayor (not in movie; based on Ed Koch): Ernest Borgnine, or David Opatoshu
McCoy's wife and girlfriend: Joan Allen, or Julianne Moore, or Barbara Hershey, or Jessica Lange, or Meryl Streep; Laura Dern as girlfriend
..and now a word from our sponsor...
Punny post title, btw.
I don't know, but not Kim Cattrall and/or Melanie Griffith
I don't know. Griffith is the only one of the entire cast that sits well with me. What's your beef with her role?
Steve Martin had attended Garden Grove High in the 1960's when it was over 90 percent white.
Bill Pullman as Fallow, please.
Oh, for McCoy's wife: Sean Young, with proper but unflattering makeup, clothes, and hairstyle. Particularly if the tall, blond Hurt were cast as McCoy. Dark haired Young (who played Gordon Gekko's wife in Wall Street) might have looked too similar to McCoy.
Whoever plays Larry Kramer will have to have overdeveloped sternocleidomastoids.
Carl "Apollo Creed" Weathers would work.
Okay, now what about 2012:
Affleck as Sherman McCoy?
Arkin as Vogel?
Seth Rogen as Kramer?
Jason Segel is a little too tall, but he'd be okay as Kramer.
Rogen would work as Kramer. Segel could play the cop Goldberg, though it would probably be too small a part for him.
Affleck would work as McCoy. For his mistress, Ashley Greene. For Fallow, maybe Ewan McGregor?
"Okay, now what about 2012:"
Jude Law or Ewan McGregor as Fallow.
you mention martin and murphy...
some of steve martin's films are under-rated -- "three amigos" seems a throwaway, but grows on you, a bit like the coneheads' odyssey-remake
the campfire scene in amigos is so obviously artificed and, well, campy . . . yet, the scene is absolutely sincere and charming
also "bowfinger" was funny and sweet, with a nice anti-PC subline
murphy's jfk impression was unforgettable
NOT Laura Dern as Maria, the girlfriend! Gah. Maria must be brunette, languid, and sexy beyond reason, all of which are the opposite of Laura Dern.
I think Connie Sellecca or Veronica Hamel would have been nice choices for the wife (remember she's got to be starved-looking, well on her way to being a social x-ray), and maybe Phoebe Cates or Gina Gershon for Maria.
"McCoy's wife and girlfriend (Kim Cattrall and Melanie Griffith): I don't know, but not Kim Cattrall and/or Melanie Griffith"
Just swapping them around would have been a big step up. AIR McCoy's wife was supposed to be a mistress-type, and vice-versa.
In contrast, Wolfe got very lucky with the casting of The Right Stuff in 1983: Sam Shepherd, Ed Harris, Dennis Quaid, Fred Ward, and Scott Glenn. Tiny roles: Jeff Goldblum (hey, it's got space and science in it and who know more about that stuff than Jeff Goldblum?), Harry Shearer, and Anthony Munoz of the Bengals as the hospital orderly.
Many good suggestions but I cannot believe that no-one has nominated the one and only choice for Peter Fallow: Peter O'Toole!
I recall Tom Wolfe saying he thought Chevy Chase should have been cast as Sherman McCoy. Seems like an odd choice to me.
Wolfe's 1960s article about bootlegger/stock car driver Junior Johnson was made into a poorly marketed but pretty decent movie called something like The Last American Hero about 40 years ago, with a very young Jeff Bridges as the star. I think I saw it around 1975 in a car-oriented double feature with American Graffiti.
They used to do theme double features like that, like Deer Hunter / Apocalypse Now.
" AIR McCoy's wife was supposed to be a mistress-type, and vice-versa."
You recall incorrectly. McCoy's wife was a couple of years older than him, and considered by the tabloids to be plain in comparison to Maria. I could picture her looking like a ten years younger version of Jenny Sanford (who is 50), the former first lady of South Carolina whose husband jetted off to Argentina unannounced for a tryst with his mistress a few years ago.
"Anthony Munoz of the Bengals as the hospital orderly."
Raises an interesting question: who do you cast from the ranks of NFL players, current or retired, to play Rev. Bacon today? Michael Strahan?
"Many good suggestions but I cannot believe that no-one has nominated the one and only choice for Peter Fallow: Peter O'Toole!"
Would have been almost 60 at the time -- a little too old for the role.
Oooh fun! This is for 2012.
I'll do the women first.
Judy is supposed to be a porcelain, ethereal, classic beauty who is past her prime: Either starve Julianne Moore to a social skeleton or detox Ellen Pompeo from botox. Possibly Jenny Garth.
Maria is young, curvy, darker shade of white and with beauty that is sexual: Selena Gomez or Vanessa Hudgens.
Rhoda Kramer is flabby, Jewish and, at 29, already looks like her mother: Lena Dunham is perfect.
Shelly is supposed to appear non-ethnic and impressionable enough to inspire Kramer towards triple douche-bagery and look good in dark lipstick: Ellen Page.
Peter Fallow is supposed to be not ageing gracefully, with thinning hair and all that: Leonardo DiCaprio had blimped out before and he can do it again. If he could also pull off a British accent, he's hired. Or Jonathan Rhys Meyers would be just great.
Sherman: Jon Hamm
Kramer is a balding former meat head who doesn't look Jewish, even though he is: I can't come up with a suitable actor, but I know we could find him by visiting a gym on the northern border of Chicago city limits and picking out one of the Polish dudes in their mid thirties.
Myron Kovitsky: Judge Judy
Reverend Bacon: Can't picture him as anyone other than Al Sharpton.
Killian: Robert Downey Jr.
What's his face who gave Rev Bacon money for a non-existent daycare: Ashton Kutchner.
"What's his face who gave Rev Bacon money for a non-existent daycare: Ashton Kutchner."
The naive Episcopalian charity representative? How about Paul Dano?
The naive Episcopalian charity representative? How about Paul Dano?
For 1990, how about Charles Grodin?
As for Killian, I always picture him as Peter Falk ("Colombo") when reading the book (even though he's a lawyer not a detective).
For 2012, Judge Judy as Myron Kovitsky is perfect, lol.
Maya's suggestions are very good indeed, although I agree with Steve that Paul Dano would be better than my Iowa homeboy Ashton. The latter looks Methodist at best, certainly not Episcopalian. Judge Judy is an inspired choice!
Casting Fallows immediately made me think of Jude Law. He's got the right hairline, is about the right age, and has the right supercilious look. He's too good looking, of course, but then most actors are for the parts they play.
Michael Douglas should definitely have had some role in the original version.
After hearing about how bad BOTV was for about 20 years, I finally happened to see it around three years ago. I found it pretty enjoyable. I had read the book.
In contrast, Wolfe got very lucky with the casting of The Right Stuff in 1983
Very true, and yet he still hated the movie and disassociated himself from it before it even premiered.
I always saw Killian in 1990 as James Woods.
Michael Richards not Richard
I don't know. I read Bonfire while on vacation in Mexico. It truly rocked my world. I had trouble just walking for a while there. Only one or two other novels have ever hit me that hard.
But I can't open it again. I don't want to reread it. I don't even want to think about it.
I do remember being outraged at the casting of Morgan Freeman, still am. If Ed Koch can play himself why not Al Sharpton?
Albertosaurus
"Many good suggestions but I cannot believe that no-one has nominated the one and only choice for Peter Fallow: Peter O'Toole!"
Richard Harris would be even better - he played that exact kind of conceited and resentful Englishman in "Unforgiven."
Andie MacDowell as Maria? Maria is a Southerner, and MacDowell (who has a large Internet anti-fan base) would probably be more believable as an unlikable character than the saintly person she was supposed to be in Groundhog Day. Come to think of it, Julia Roberts also has a lot of anti-fans - maybe she could have used her natural accent for once.
Wow! A whole new way for middle-class white guys to waste time: Fantasy Film Studio
Jude Law was not bad as a scummy journalist in Contagion.
I think Colin Firth would make a good Sherman McCoy in a 2012 version. I found him very boring in the King's speech so I think he could fill the role nicely. The only potential drawback is that he is a little on the old side. Jason Bateman would be another good choice - he essentially played the foil to everyone else on Arrested Development.
Charlize Theron has the frosty beauty but approaching-the-wall look to be the wife. She might be too charismatic, though.
I think Anna Kendrick is sexy enough to be the mistress but others might not agree.
For Fallow, Jonah Hill is the best I can come up with.
Dave Chappelle is quite versatile so I think if you put him through lots of makeup he could do Rev. Bacon; I thought that scene from the book was designed to pretty overtly humorous anyways.
pee wee herman as sherman mccoy
christopher hitchens as peter fallow
also, must be made with an all-white cast so as not to offend.
According to The Devil's Candy,, the book about the making of the movie, a very young Uma Thurman was in the running to play McCoy's mistress.
Kevin Dunn was a pretty great Chuck Colson in Nixon.
For Fallows, 2012: how about Robert Downey? He can pull off a passable English accent, and we know he knows how to act like a drunk...
McCoy is tough. Even in 1990, he was a dying breed. Back then I would have done James Spader (as long as he toned down his spaderness a bit). Today, maybe
Aaron Eckhart?
Steve,
Awesome joke about Jerry Orbach and Chris Noth as the detectives, but would anyone outside of the Steve-o-sphere get it?
"Tall, rawboned, explosively crazy prisoner (not in movie; based presumably on Hunter S. Thompson): Michael Richards."
Put a heavy five o'clock shadow on Richards, and let him vent some of that "rage" of his, and I can definitely see him as utterly terrifying.
You're right that a two-hour movie was a mistake; a miniseries, though one much shorter than Brideshead Revisited, probably would have been a better decision.
Jason Alexander is probably too short to be Kramer, but perhaps that is why Michael Richards was cast as him?
In general, the idea of making a 2 hour movie out of Bonfire of the Vanities was always pretty hopeless. The screenwriter was a guy who had done a pretty good job movie-izing John Updike's The Witches of Eastwick, so maybe they figured he had some magic in him. I don't know. There's a book about the making of the movie that I haven't read.
If I remember the book correctly a screenplay was written and then Bruce Willis became a big star and a bigger role was written for him which took away from the film as originally written.
It turned into a warning as to how not to make a film.
I remember wanting to walk out of the theater, but being inhibited by the fact that I brought a girl friend. All the biggest payoffs for the reader in the novel were scrubbed from the screenplay. I absolutely loved the book, but Tom Hanks and Morgan Freeman stunk in the movie. In fact Hanks stunk so bad that to this day I'm still boycotting Forrest Gump: I will never ever watch another Tom Hanks movie. Never, never, never.
Oh well, at least Tom Wolf got a nice payday.
Even in 1990 William Hurt was too old to be Sherman McCoy. You wanted a young WASP/Yuppie the audience was primed to hate - someone like Christian Bale, if he'd been the right age.
Heh. Patrick Bateman worked for Pierce and Pierce, just like McCoy.
I saw a bookTV interview where a caller asked Wolfe if he thought Bonfire inspired American Psycho, and Wolfe and the interviewer acted as if they couldn't hear him.
I'd much rather see a movie version of "A Man in Full", particularly the freezer scenes with the "crach and burners" and the part where the Southern Millioner Croker destroys his own jet so the ballifs don't get hold of it.
A Man in Full wasn't a clever as Bonfire of the Vanities, but it would make a much better film from a cinematic perspective.
Not sure who would play the young hero with the over-developed forearms though.
Connie Sellecca? Arf! James Woods would have been a great Killian. Just a slight twist on "True Believer," though maybe he'd feel typecast. How about Morton Downey Jr. as the judge?
John Hurt as Fallow.
Gilbert P.
Yes, Wolfe wanted Chevy Chase, mostly because he thought Chase had Sherman's chin (the chin is the one physical feature that Wolfe uses to define Sherman throughout the book).
And, Steve, your recollection of the yellow tie thing is not quite right, Sherman does not make fun of them or have a conversation about it, he is alone when he sees them, they are coming out of the Carlyle which is near his apartment, and his world is already crumbling, he mostly thinks how they are having a great time and doesn't it suck that world goes on even as his is imploding.
Eddie Hayes could play himself, he was actually in Goodfellas.
Whoopi Goldberg as Reverend Bacon.
A young Bob Hoskins as Kramer.
Also, Fallow as described was blonde with a high forehead and widow's peak and a long thin nose.
Kramer was not a schlub, he was a lifter and had a good physique, Wolfe makes a point of that several times.
And don't forget Sir Gerald Steiner, sort of a Murdoch-Maxwell composite (does anyone remember Robert Maxwell? Man overboard!)
Again, I hate to say it, but the obnoxious Jewish short squat body-builder power-lifter of that era would have been Al Franken.
Whiskey:"Replace Tom Hanks with say, Patrick Swayze, you've got a different movie. Yeah, I know, the guy made a ton of bad 80's movies. But he could play All-American in way that Hanks, Mr. Loveable wanting to be Loved, could not.
Why not Swayze?"
Because one thing that Swayze could not play is an East Coast WASP
Dennis Rodman (sp?) as Buck.
Lil Wayne as the thug who caused the whole ordeal by trying to rob Sherman and Maria.
Honey Boo Boo as Campbel.
So, for a 2013 miniseries:
Sherman McCoy: I really like the Aaron Eckhart suggestion above. He's WASPy-looking, sort of dull but also can play tough, and he's even got the chin.
Peter Fallow: Leaves me sort of stumped. Steve Coogan, if you want to emphasize the comically pathetic aspects of the character? I doubt that he can convincingly play a once-posh Englishman with an upper crust-y accent, but Colin Farrell can certainly play drunk and dissipated. Hugh Grant is really too old for the part today, but alcoholics always look older than they are, so it might still work. For a 1990 version, I'd definitely push Alan Rickman.
Judge Kovitsky: Stanley Tucci is the first person who jumps to mind when I think of that ferocity, but it does seem sort of silly to have an Italian play an uber-Jewish judge when there are so many Jewish actors available. If I were casting a 1990 version, I'd jump on Jerry Stiller, even though he was probably way too old even then.
Kramer: I haven't seen much of Ben Stiller's dramatic side, but he has a track record of playing iron-pumping fitness fanatics (Dodgeball, Heavyweights), and with his family background, he'd be able to do interesting things with a Jewish character who has assimilated to an Irish-American departmental culture.
Rev. Bacon: Tom Wright, to emphasize the Reverend's cool seriousness, or maybe Keith David for a more lively, slightly comical take.
Detectives: The Irish detective is, if memory serves, described as a short guy, so Donnie Wahlberg at 5'10" is probably out. Brendan Fletcher could pull it off, at 5'6". Add a handlebar mustache to Andy Samberg, and he could probably steal some scenes as a slightly crazy, very scary Jewish detective.
Albert Vogel: Elliot Gould or Leonard Nimoy.
Sort of merging the is it time to go back to Baseball with this.
Anyone notice a difference between FOX's and their rivals coverage?
The Cardinals series was all about the Cardinals and the Tigers opponents barely get a mention according to people not enamored with Joe Buck and Tim McCarver.
You are watching a different game with their commentary just as changing the cast would make a completely different film even if there were no script changes.
Rob Ryan says the Giants do not respect his ability just like they do with Rex because the Cowboys beat the Giants 2 wins and 3 losses ago for the Cowboys which was 5 wins and 1 loss ago for the Giants.
How am I meant to tell these twins brothers apart?
Casting - almost as difficult as real life,
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