Al Pacino wouldn't have been my first choice to lead an adaptation of
Phillip Roth's 2009 published novel
The Humbling - I actually read the book with Ben Kingsley in mind, perhaps partly because of his top-rate turn in the Roth adaptation Elegy, but it's Scarface who has got the gig.
Deadline say Pacino is to re-team with director
Barry Levinson having successfully worked together on the Emmy-winning HBO movie You Dont Know Jack on Roth's novel about respected stage actor Simon Axler who is aware but can't stop his own breakdown and who shacks up with a younger, lesbian lover. As with all Roth novels it's themes over plot, and his usual favourites - aging, sexual politics and the male psyche are all explored. It's a good book, I read it on a plane journey last year and it's opening pages will grab you. We follow a thespian who just loses his ability to perform on stage, he forgets how to act at the worst moment and how Pacino plays it will determine if he will work in the lead role. A slight annoyance perhaps is that the actor on the page is written as an imposing man 6"4 tall and Pacino is a short 5"6 (not that Ben Kingsley is a giant either at two inches taller) but Pacino is so good we won't care. The novel goes into some particularly dark places, more so than recent Levinson flicks but this is top tier talent and so I'm a very happy man to know the material is going to be tackled seriously. Levinson's schedule has now become free to quickly shoot this one in the fall, financed by Millennium Films/Nu Image after the trouble pre-production of
Gotti: Three Generations has delayed that gangster flick. Adapted by
The Graduate screenwriter
Buck Henry (PERFECT), newcomer
Michal Zebede and Levinson himself, a casting search is on for the only other notable characters including his agent and the young lover, the latter vital to the success of the film. Exciting stuff and if you haven't yet checked out the last Roth adaptation Elegy - go and seek it out now.