David O Russell’s upcoming biopic of the American Football legend John Madden will star Christian Bale and Nicolas Cage. Not a combustible trio at all, that.
We’ve known since August that Nicolas Cage would be playing John Madden in David O Russell’s next film, Madden, a biopic of the NFL legend. The film will chart Madden’s rise from the head coach of the Oakland Raiders to becoming one of the best-known football reporters in America.
As if Nicolas Cage and David O Russell weren’t enough of a creatively combustible pairing, Christian Bale has now also joined the cast as former Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis, according to The Insneider (via World Of Reel). Bale and Russell have collaborated several times before, including on American Hustle, The Fighter and Amsterdam. The thought of Bale and Cage going toe to toe onscreen is an exciting one, as the partnership between their real-life counterparts would lead to success before Madden exited NFL coaching and became the face of the EA videogame franchise.
In fact, that saga is said to be one of the main plot points of the film, with the project being described as a ‘videogame movie’ and not a traditional biopic. Just how deeply Russell’s film delves into that aspect of Madden’s career we’ll have to wait and see, but we can’t see Russell making a movie that ends up spending too much of its runtime venerating a videogame series. Who knows though? Maybe he’s a fan.
Bale will next be seen in Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Bride, which is set to release at some point next year and will see the actor play Frankenstein’s Monster in what has been described as a punk, violent and wildly romantic maybe-musical. It’s coming courtesy of Warner Bros.
As for Cage, he is reportedly the third actor to slot into the role of Madden after Will Ferrell and Hugh Jackman backed out. Cambron Clark wrote the original Black List screenplay, which O Russell rewrote into the final shooting script. The project is st to go before cameras in the eearly part of next year. When we hear more, we’ll certainly let you know.
