Ryan Gosling’s continues to line up a series of potential projects. The Hollywood Reporter announced yesterday that Warners Brothers has purchased the rights to make a big screen adaptation of Jeffery Spivak’s book Buzz: The Life And Art Of Busby Berkeley. The studio is making plans for Ryan Gosling to produce and possibly both star and direct the biopic on the highly influential filmmaker, Busby Berkeley.

Originally published back in 2010, Jeffery Spivak’s biography on the innovate Busby Berkeley follows the artist from his early years on Broadway to his eventual place in the director’s chair. Berkeley is known for his clever inventiveness and signature style represented in films like 42 Street, Gold Diggers Of 1933 and Dames all released in the early 1930s. Berkeley was famous for his ability to distract audiences from the worries of the Great Depression. While his style and work are known to many, Busby Berkeley was known to have a quiet and possibly mysterious private life. The filmmaker paved the way with many at-the-time highly experimental techniques including his most famous “the parade of faces” in which anonymous performers are given an identity with a close-up. Berkeley had an uncanny knack for arranging beautifully complex formations of dancers as well with shots never seen before by an audience. The filmmaker was nominated on three occasions for Best Dance Direction at the Academy awards, a category that no longer exists in today’s day and age. Spivak’s biography on Busby Berkeley uses personal letters, interviews as well as Berkeley’s private memoirs to paint a detailed picture of a beloved one of a kind filmmaker from Hollywood’s early years.



Ryan Gosling will team up with producer Marc Platt to make the Busby Berkeley biopic. Gosling first worked with Platt on Nicolas Winding Refn’s art-house hit Drive back in 2011. The Busby Berkeley biopic has the possibility of being Ryan Gosling’s follow-up feature film to his directorial debut How To Catch A Monster which is expected to be released some time later this year. The fantasy neo-noir is rumored to be about a single mother that begins to live a dark lifestyle while her son uncovers a road leading to an underwater paradise. The film features Gosling’s Drive co-star and Mad Men star Christina Hendricks as the single mother, Billy, with roles played by Eva Mendes and Hanna’s Saoirse Ronan as well. Platt also produced How To Catch A Monster and has several years of experience in handling Broadway musicals including the smash hits Wicked and Legally Blonde.

The Academy award nominated Canadian actor can next be seen in an untitled Terrance Malick film about two intersecting love triangles set against the music scene is Austin, Texas. The film also features Michael Fassbender, Natalie Portman, Cate Blanchett and Christian Bale in roles though as typical for Terrance Malick films, audiences will have to wait and see whether or not their favourite actor/actress makes it into the final cut of the film. No further details have been announced at this time by Warners Brothers about the Busby Berkeley biopic to be made by Ryan Gosling.

By Benjamin Murray

Sources:

Coming Soon

The Hollywood Reporter

Variety

Share this: Print

LinkedIn

Pinterest

Pocket

Reddit

Twitter

Facebook

Tumblr

