Gleeson courtesy of Zimbio
Michael Fassbender and Domhall Gleeson are attached to star in Film4's comedy "Frank". Lenny Abrahamson will direct from a script by Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan. Film4 will co-finance the pic with the Irish Film Board. Gleeson will play an aspiring musician who finds himself in over his head when he joins an eccentric rock band led by Fassbender. Pic is a co-production between Runaway Fridge and Element Pictures.
More to come...
Fass in a comedy... in a rock band... with long hair... possibly singing and/or playing an instrument... I'm in! We all know that Fass repeatedly say's he wanted to be in a rock band when he was younger. Well...
Variety
Update 1 - New Info & clarification:
![]()
Photograph: Max Rossi/Reuters
Michael Fassbender and Domhnall Gleeson will star as as an off-the-wall musician and a young man who joins his band in Frank, from Garage director Lenny Abrahamson.
Abrahamson's film centres on Jon (Gleeson), who discovers he has bitten off more than he can chew when he joins an eccentric band led by the mysterious and enigmatic title character (Fassbender). Written by Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan, the Film 4 production has also received funding from the Irish Film Board. It is due to shoot in late 2012.
Ronson took to Twitter today in the wake of the announcement to deny suggestions that Fassbender's character is based on his former collaborator Frank Sidebottom, the Manchester-based comic and musician whose papier-mâché-headed persona was popular on northwest television throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s. Chris Sievey, who performed as Sidebottom, also fronted the band the Freshies in the late 1970s and early 80s.
"Hey! The film isn't a film about Frank Sidebottom. It's totally made up and - whilst inspired by Frank - is inspired by other people too," tweeted Ronson. "Daniel Johnston and Captain Beefheart are other inspirations. Bowled over that Michael Fassbender and Domhnall Gleeson are in our film."
Gleeson is best known for his portrayal of wizard Bill Weasley in the Harry Potter films. The Irish actor, son of Brendan, recently finished shooting a lead role in Richard Curtis's new comedy About Time, and has smaller roles in the comic-book adaptation Dredd, Anna Karenina, and Shadow Dancer, an IRA thriller. Fassbender most recently had a pivotal role in Ridley Scott's ambitious science fiction film Prometheus, and is currently filming The Counsellor for the same director, based on an original Cormac McCarthy screenplay.
Ronson and Straughan wrote the 2009 George Clooney-starring drama The Men Who Stare at Goats, based on Ronson's own 2004 book about the US army's exploration of new age concepts. Straughan was also one of the writers of the well-received 2011 Tomas Alfredson cold war spy thriller Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, based on the John le Carré novel.
The Dublin-born Abrahamson's film Garage, about a man with learning difficulties who strikes up a friendship with a teenage boy at the rural Irish petrol station where they both work, won the CICAE cinema prize at the Directors' Fortnight in Cannes 2008, while his previous film Adam and Paul won him the best director award at the Irish film and TV awards. His new film What Richard Did will have its world premiere at Toronto later this month.
Source: Guardian UK
Update 1 - New Info & clarification:
Michael Fassbender and Domhnall Gleeson will star as as an off-the-wall musician and a young man who joins his band in Frank, from Garage director Lenny Abrahamson.
Abrahamson's film centres on Jon (Gleeson), who discovers he has bitten off more than he can chew when he joins an eccentric band led by the mysterious and enigmatic title character (Fassbender). Written by Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan, the Film 4 production has also received funding from the Irish Film Board. It is due to shoot in late 2012.
Ronson took to Twitter today in the wake of the announcement to deny suggestions that Fassbender's character is based on his former collaborator Frank Sidebottom, the Manchester-based comic and musician whose papier-mâché-headed persona was popular on northwest television throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s. Chris Sievey, who performed as Sidebottom, also fronted the band the Freshies in the late 1970s and early 80s.
"Hey! The film isn't a film about Frank Sidebottom. It's totally made up and - whilst inspired by Frank - is inspired by other people too," tweeted Ronson. "Daniel Johnston and Captain Beefheart are other inspirations. Bowled over that Michael Fassbender and Domhnall Gleeson are in our film."
Gleeson is best known for his portrayal of wizard Bill Weasley in the Harry Potter films. The Irish actor, son of Brendan, recently finished shooting a lead role in Richard Curtis's new comedy About Time, and has smaller roles in the comic-book adaptation Dredd, Anna Karenina, and Shadow Dancer, an IRA thriller. Fassbender most recently had a pivotal role in Ridley Scott's ambitious science fiction film Prometheus, and is currently filming The Counsellor for the same director, based on an original Cormac McCarthy screenplay.
Ronson and Straughan wrote the 2009 George Clooney-starring drama The Men Who Stare at Goats, based on Ronson's own 2004 book about the US army's exploration of new age concepts. Straughan was also one of the writers of the well-received 2011 Tomas Alfredson cold war spy thriller Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, based on the John le Carré novel.
The Dublin-born Abrahamson's film Garage, about a man with learning difficulties who strikes up a friendship with a teenage boy at the rural Irish petrol station where they both work, won the CICAE cinema prize at the Directors' Fortnight in Cannes 2008, while his previous film Adam and Paul won him the best director award at the Irish film and TV awards. His new film What Richard Did will have its world premiere at Toronto later this month.
Source: Guardian UK
