Reeves, Zeta-Jones eyeing 'Stompanato'

[Hustler]

how about Hugh Jackman or Clive Owen?

How about Sean Penn or Kevin Spacey?

[Penelope]

Here's a picture of Lana, Johnny and Cheryl.

Angelina is physically wrong for Lana--who was more rounded and svelte than the angular Jolie. I've never seen an episode of Gilmore Girls, so I don't know much about Lauren Graham; from pics on the net, her face seems to be right, though it would be interesting to see her as a blonde. Personally, I was thinking Charlize Theron would be perfect--it would be nice to see her play a glam character, I've always thought her best performances were her glam, charisma-driven roles in The Devil's Advocate and Head in the Clouds.

Franco strikes me as too young; although, his Tristan + Isolde co-star Rufus Sewell would be a terrific choice; or, how about Hugh Jackman or Clive Owen?

Alexis Bleidel was wonderful in Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants, so I would be fine with her as Cheryl; alternately, how about Kate Mara, who played Alma, Jr., in Brokeback Mountain?

[kaytodd]

Zeta-Jones could do a good job as Rose. She has not shown she is a top notch actress, but she has done well playing tough, hard-hearted resourceful women (Chicago, Traffic, Intolerable Cruelty, Entrapment). And I think she would have no problem wearing makeup to age herself for this role.

And I agree Anne Hathaway would be a good Gypsy. She has a tall coltish build perfect for playing a dancer (but I do not know how tall the real Gypsy was) and she bears a superficial to Zeta-Jones.

And I would have no problem paying eight to ten bucks to see these two gorgeous women on the big screen at the same time, especially if one or both of them are likely to take off their clothes.

Getting back on topic, imdb.com currently lists the Stompanato film as "announced" with Reeves and Zeta-Jones. The writers are David Webb Peoples and Sebastian Gutierrez (among his writing credits are Gothika and The Big Bounce). Among the producers are guys with producing credits like Requiem For A Dream, The Exorcism Of Emily Rose, Tigerland, The Matrix, and The Devil's Advocate (could help explain Reeve's interest in this project). Sounds like serious people are behind this and it could happen. I hope they get a good director and reconsider casting Zeta-Jones and Reeves. Good actors but they just don't seem right. Reeves always has that distinctive voice and it will not sound convincing as an Italian mobster.

Off the top of my head, Angelina Jolie and Lauren Graham are good choices for Lana even though they are much taller. James Franco strikes me as a good choice for Stompanato.

I have no ideas on Cheryl Crane. Dakota Fanning? She will be thirteen next year and Crane was fourteen when she stabbed Stompanato. I think she has the acting chops. But she will need to physically fill out very quickly. Alexis Bedel? Good actress and the right physical type but I wonder if she wants to play another teenager as she enters her mid-twenties.

[Big Magilla]

This bunch has been floating pie-in-the-sky ideas ever since Chicago. First it was going to be a re-make of Damn Yankees, then a remake of Guys and Dolls. None have come to pass.

Zeta-Jones is currently making a film in which she plays a chef which Michael Douglas says will be her greatest acting ever because she can't cook!

Am I the only one who thinks Rosalind Russell did a creditable job as Mama Rose? Granted her singing was dubbed by Lisa Kirk, but Roz's boisterous performance was one of her best. She was certainly better than Bete Midler in the TV re-make.

[Reza]

Zeta-Jones as Mama Rose. What absurd casting! Surely she will have more sense than to accept?

[Damien]

Zeta-Jones may be otherwise engaged.

From Liz Smith's column today:

'SOME PEOPLE got it and make it pay, some people can't even give it away. This people's got it and this people's spreading it around," goes Steve Sondheim's famous lyric from the Broadway musical "Gypsy."

Now the rumor is out and hot that the Weinstein Company is close on the heels of director Rob Marshall for a movie version of the show about the evolution of that famous stripper - Gypsy Rose Lee - and her infamous stage mother, Rose. This incredible "best damn show I've seen in years!" (courtesy of New York Times critic Walter Kerr) opened to acclaim in 1959 with Broadway's hit-making powerhouse, Ethel Merman, in the role of Mama Rose. The Arthur Laurents "book" with Jule Styne music and Sondheim's lyrics has been revived over and over, usually successfully, with such as Angela Lansbury and Tyne Daly playing the part. Hollywood made a botch of it back in 1962 when they put the sleek Rosalind Russell in the role. (The only saving grace of this version was the delicious Natalie Wood as Gypsy.)

OK. So Harvey and Bob Weinstein now have a vision. In spite of the critical flop of Rob Marshall's more recent (and ravishing, I thought) "Memoirs of a Geisha," these guys think Rob can do something as magical with "Gypsy" as he did for Bob Fosse's "Chicago." That won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2002.

Now, I hope you're sitting down. This new big-screen "Gypsy" would be a vehicle for another "Chicago" alum, a woman who also walked off with an Oscar, even though, at the time, she was 81/2 months pregnant. I do mean the gorgeous Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Well, Mama Rose doesn't have to be middle-age and matronly in the Merman mode. Zeta-Jones is 35, so she could, conceivably, play a woman with a teenage daughter. Maybe a new look at the stage-managing mom as a sexy, youthful, fully realized female who is unfortunately living through her children will be a treat! (Bernadette Peters was a more alluring Rose than usual in the revival several seasons back.)

And, nobody asked me, but I see the marvelous Anne Hathaway as a perfect Gypsy in this latest look at an ultimate moment in show business.
======================

If Rob Marshall does do this film, it -- along with the medicority that is Memoirs Of A Geisha -- will show once and for all and for all time that Bill Condon was the real auteur of Chiicago.

[Reza]

and isn't Woody Allen's September (1987) inspired by this scandal?

Yes certain plot points were. The conflict between Mia Farrow's troubled daughter and Elaine Stritch's actress mother.

I have been hunting high and low for Where Love Has Gone (1964). Is it ever shown on tv or available on DVD?

[Penelope]

Amazingly, neither a feature film nor a TV movie has ever been made about this event; the closest we've seen to an "actual" portrayal was the small bit in LA Confidential where Guy Pearce and Kevin Spacey run into Lana and Johnny at a bar. Surprisingly, Cheryl Crane's book about this, Detour, has never been made into a movie or TV film--perhaps because she was very open about being a lesbian it scared producers away.

I've never seen them, but I know of two films that are loosely based on these events: Where Love Has Gone (1964), based on a novel by Harold Robbins (with a script written by Peyton Place scribe John Michael Hayes), starring Susan Hayward, Bette Davis, Mike Conners and Joey Heatherton; and isn't Woody Allen's September (1987) inspired by this scandal?

[kaytodd]

I would not be surprised if this project gets revived soon. Somebody has to make this film. Sharon Stone and Antonio Banderas may be a little old now to play the principals but the film should still be made.

What a great film story: a troubled teen stabs her very famous mother's abusive lover and he also happens to be a prominent mobster. And there are rumors swirling that the killing actually had more to do with a sexual relationship between the teen and the mobster. And it is a true story. Perhaps Akiva Goldsman could screw up that script, but I am not even sure of that.

Has there already been a feature or TV film of this story? There has to have been one, maybe a fictionalized one with the names changed.

[Penelope]

Hadn't heard anything about this in a while, and based on these comments in an interview with Keanu Reeves, it looks like it won't be happening at all:

As recently as August 2005 there were rumors of a movie about the murder of Lana Turner’s lover, Johnny Stompanato, floating around. Keanu Reeves and Catherine Zeta-Jones were supposedly attached to star in the film. Unfortunately, it looks as though that project's dead in the water. “We tried to have that happen, but that didn’t work out,” said Reeves. “It’s a long story.” Reeves’ [The Lake House] co-star Sandra Bullock said it’s a story that needs to be heard and expressed disbelief that the film couldn’t come together. Reeves agreed. “Yeah it’s fantastic, but it didn’t work out.”

[Penelope]

From IMDb:

Stone Hits Out at Zeta-Jones Casting

Sharon Stone is furious Catherine Zeta-Jones will play Lana Turner in a new biopic, because she was the screen legend's first choice. The Postman Always Rings Twice actress met Stone before she died of throat cancer in 1995 and Stone reveals Turner wanted her to star in a movie celebrating her life. The film will look at eight-times married Turner's tumultuous marriage to gangster Johnny Stompanato, to be played by Keanu Reeves, who was killed in 1958 by her daughter Cheryl Crane. Stone says, "I met Lana in her final years and liked her a great deal. She was every inch the movie star and we got along really well. She said if there was a film to be made on her life, then I was her choice. Lana's life is one of the more interesting of the Hollywood greats. Lana really rocked."

[Big Magilla]

Me, too. I am not looking forward to seeing CZJ in a blonde wig, and I can't picture Reeves as Stompanato at all.

[Penelope]

I'm assuming you mean Banderas and Stone would be better than Reeves and CZJ...? If so, I concur.

[kaytodd]

I read some time ago that Sharon Stone and Antonio Banderas were planning to star in this film or another film about Stompanato/Turner. Much better casting, IMO.

[Penelope]

A long-in-the-works project, that originally had Sharon Stone attached several years ago...the only thing CZJ has going for her is her nose (it's just like Lana's), but her coloring is all wrong, and Reeves would, I'm afraid, be woefully miscast as Stompanato. For reference, here's the real people.

And then, of course, there's the questionable presence of Lyne directing this....

Reeves, Zeta-Jones eyeing 'Stompanato'

Wed Aug 24, 2005 01:33 AM ET

By Borys Kit

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Keanu Reeves and Catherine Zeta-Jones are circling a movie about Johnny Stompanato, the hoodlum killed by the teen daughter of his girlfriend, actress Lana Turner.

Adrian Lyne ("Unfaithful") is attached to direct "Stompanato," which has landed on the steps of Warner Bros. Pictures but has not yet made the studio its home.

Stompanato, a World War II vet-turned-small-time hood and wannabe actor, was killed on Good Friday 1958 in the Beverly Hills home of Turner by 14-year-old Cheryl Crane. The death was ruled as justifiable homicide, but rumors flew that Crane and Stompanato had been lovers, while other rumors flew that Turner actually killed Stompanato and let her daughter take the rap.

Reeves, last in theaters with "Constantine," just completed work on Warners' "Il Mare," a time-travel romance that reunited him with "Speed" partner Sandra Bullock. Zeta-Jones returns to theaters in the fall with "The Legend of Zorro."