We’ve known him as Ali G. We’ve known his as Borat. We’ve known him as Brüno. We’ll soon be getting to know him as The Dictator (due out in May next year).
And now Variety report that none other than the Golden Globe-winning and Emmy-, BAFTA-, and Oscar-nominated actor, Sacha Baron Cohen, is close to finalising talks to star in Quentin Tarantino’s next highly anticipated feature film, Django Unchained.
The news is the latest in a slew of roles cast over the past few months, the most recent being Kerry Washington being chosen as the film’s female lead and Joseph Gordon-Levitt hopefully signing on, pending scheduling possibilities.
The film is being led by Jamie Foxx, with an immense supporting cast that also includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Don Johnson, and now hopefully Baron Cohen too. Foxx will play the titular Django,
“a slave who’s liberated by a German dentist-turned-bounty hunter and taught the tricks of the trade by his mentor. Django’s major goal in life is to recover his wife, and to do it he needs to get past the villainous ranch owner Calvin Candie (DiCaprio), who runs Candyland, a despicable club and plantation in Mississippi where female slaves are exploited as sex objects and males are pitted against each other in “mandingo”-style death matches. Candie is a slave’s worst nightmare, and that is where Django’s wife Broomhilda is an abused slave.”
Baron Cohen’s role is said to be one of the last major roles cast for the film, and provided talks go well, he’ll be playing Scotty, a gambling man who buys Washington’s Broomhilda to be his companion. And according to Variety,
“Though the part is small, sources said Tarantino was very particular on who he wanted to play it, given the character’s importance to the story.”
He might be a bit of a divisive actor, somewhat surrounded in controversy, but I think Baron Cohen is a brilliant and talented actor, not to mention something of a genius, and it’s interesting to see that he’s mixing his career up a bit and taking on roles we’re not used to seeing him in. We’ll next get to see him, for example, in Martin Scorsese’s anticipated Hugo (due out on 2nd December), and I’m sure just a few years ago, there wouldn’t be many who’d think Baron Cohen would be signing on for a Scorsese film, and a family film no less.
Tarantino’s films are always nothing short of amazing, and I’ve been loving the casting news so much over the past few months. If Baron Cohen’s part is one of the last to be cast, then the slew of news that we’ve been getting recently is probably going to be coming to a slow now, with production scheduled to begin at the start of the year. Django Unchained is set to be released on Christmas Day in the States next year, and I’m hoping it will get the same release date here, because it cannot come fast enough.
