Is Hollywood running out of ideas for new movies? Here is some potential affirmative evidence: Roku Inc. (NASDAQ:ROKU) announced a biopic on the life and career of “Weird Al" Yankovic starring Daniel Radcliffe from the “Harry Potter” films.
What (Or, More Accurately, WTF) Happened: “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story,” will be presented as an exclusive on The Roku Channel, according to a Deadline report.
Yankovic wrote the screenplay with Eric Appel, a writer/director from the “Funny or Die” comedy video website. Appel, who has directed episodes on the television series “The Office” and “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” will direct the feature.
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Why (Oh, Why?) It Happened: Yankovic first gained notice as a 16-year-old in 1976 when his home-recorded comedy song "Belvedere Cruisin'" was broadcast on Dr. Demento’s syndicated radio show. He gained greater exposure in the 1980s when MTV began including videos of his song parodies such as “Ricky” (an “I Love Lucy” riff on Toni Basil’s “Mickey”) and “Eat It” (a takeoff on Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” featuring a parent coaxing a picky child to consume his food).
Over the course of his career, Yankovic won five Grammy Awards and became the biggest-selling comedy recording artist of all time.
While the casting of Radcliffe might seem a tad surprising, the actor has spent much of his post-“Harry Potter” career aggressively working against typecasting, with equally unlikely roles as Beat poet Allen Ginsburg in “Kill Your Darlings” (2013), the misshapen lab assistant Igor in “Victor Frankenstein” (2015) and as the villainous industrialist in the upcoming comedy-adventure “The Lost City” opposite Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum.
Photo: 'Weird Al' Yankovic slgckgc / Flickr Creative Commons
