Anthony Hopkins to Play Alfred Hitchcock
Filed under: Drama, Casting, Scripts, Brad Pitt
"Good eeevening." The last we heard about writer/director Ryan Murphy's Alfred Hitchcock biopic was back in February. At the time it was just speculation, but today MTV Movies Blog has confirmation -- Anthony Hopkins will play Hitch. They've even got a clip of him doing the voice over there. I think it's pretty solid casting, but Hopkins better start eating! The February report mentioned Helen Mirren possibly stepping into the role of Hitchcock's wife and lifelong creative collaborator, Alma Reville, but that casting is not confirmed yet. The film is expected to be called Alfred Hitchcock Presents and will detail Hitchcock's experiences making the 1960 classic Psycho. At the time, the screenplay was seen as far too dark for mass audiences, and Hitch faced quite a few hurdles to bring the project to the big screen.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents will be written and directed by Ryan Murphy. I am a fan of Murphy's FX series Nip/Tuck, particularly the first few seasons. But any faith I had in his filmmaking went out the window with the absolutely dreadful Running with Scissors, one of my least favorite movies of 2006. Hopefully, he can redeem himself here. I can't say for certain when we'll see Alfred Hitchcock Presents, as Murphy is currently very busy in both the television and film worlds. On TV, he's overseeing Nip/Tuck and an upcoming F/X drama about a transsexual father called 4 oz. On the big screen, he's working on the Tricky Dick flick Dirty Tricks, starring Brad Pitt and Meryl Streep, with Jim Broadbent as Nixon, and Need with Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts. So it's conceivable that we won't get to see AFP for a few years. Hey, now that the wheels are in motion on the story of how Hitchcock's Psycho came to be, is it too much to ask to get a making-of biopic for Gus Van Sant's critically acclaimed remake? I kid, I kid.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-22-2007 @ 3:44PM
actorpull said...
While I'm more than willing to give anyone a second chance, Ryan Murphy's style is just a mess. I can only imagine how badly this has the potential to go, especially if he gets a prestige cast without getting decent performances out of most of them (again).
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10-22-2007 @ 5:03PM
robert said...
"Anthony Hopkins will play Hitch"
I of course immediately thought of him in the Will Smith movie and began to laugh... thanks for that.
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10-22-2007 @ 6:56PM
mrah said...
spelling on the title, eh
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10-22-2007 @ 8:01PM
modenadude said...
I'm totally into this story, creating Psycho? I love that man, it's going to be awesome.
But I don't see Hopkins as Hitchcock... even after that MTV thing - I hope Hopkins really works on his voice (and his weight) because I didn't understand a word he said, speaking so quickly. Hitchcock spoke rather slowly and pronounced everything, you wouldn't ever not be able to understand him. If he fixes that, this is going to be one helluva movie!
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10-23-2007 @ 6:49AM
Richard von Busack said...
Shouldn't they have given this role to Hoskins, not Hopkins? Maybe it was a typo. Actually, Hopkins played a guy who looked as much like Hitchcock as Hitchcock did in that minor Egoyan movie from a few years back...
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1-16-2008 @ 2:59PM
Billy-A-Dick said...
The casting of Hopkins as Hitchcock is a wonderful idea. As good as some like Bob Hoskins might be, you don't get a major movie financed on his name.
Hopkins sounds genuinely excited when he talks about this project and it's also a cool idea to have the man who played the character of Hannibal Lechter (based on real life killer Ed Gein) now play the man who made the classic "Psycho," the main character of which Norman Bates was also based on Gein.
The movie appears to be attracting top name talent. That may indicate that the new script by the author of the book "Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho" is as offbeat and absorbing as I've been hearing it is for a couple of months. I'm excited about this one.
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