Even back on Saturday Night Live, Bill Murray’s always wanted to be taken seriously as an actor; he’s certainly come a long way from his days of playing Nick the Lounge Singer and being hit over the head with a menu by Belusi shooting PEPSI! PEPSI! PEPSI! But will audiences accept him as one of the most famous figures of the 20th century?
He found fame on sketch show Saturday Night Live and is most known his comedic talent in films including Ghostbusters and Groundhog day.
But there is nothing funny about Bill Murray’s latest role, he is portraying American President Franklin D.Roosevelt in Hyde Park On Hudson.
It has been a role taken on by the likes of Hollywood heavyweights Jon Voight, Jason Robards and Kenneth Branagh so Murray,61, certainly has a lot to live up to.
Murray’s latest appointment certainly raised eyebrows throughout tinsel town as the picture is set to mix political wrangling, domestic drama and infidelity, not usually seen as part of the actor’s repertoire.
I’d actually be willing to watch it, just to see if I could suspend disbelief sufficiently during Murray’s performance. Though after the big D-Day scene, I’d still be waiting for Bill to shout “We came, we saw, we kicked Hitler’s ass!”
that odd prep-school movie? The gentle moments in what about bob? lost in translation?
He’s got game. I’d love to see what he does with FDR.
I agree that Bill Murray has become a very good actor. But to the best of my knowledge, with the exception of course of his SNL sketches, this is the first time he’s played an actual historical character.
Regarding historical characters, he has played Hunter S. Thompson (in Where the Buffalo Roam) and John Breckinridge (in Ed Wood). Maybe it’s the first time he’s played a historical character that wasn’t openly weird. Heh, and one’s sense of history might vary, too.
Liked him in The Razor’s Edge, but it was hard to take him seriously.
I’d love to see what he does. He’s grown as an actor, mostly probably by what he’s not doing on stage. I have no idea how he lives his life, but he’s got stillnesses and privacies in his characters that make him interesting. Everything I’ve read about FDR is about how he was calculating, even when he was present, so I think it would be a good match of actor and character.
and, besides, comedians do politics: al franken started as baggage-handling mook in Trading Places.
I hate war
But I hate
Eleanor more…
Eleanor, you’re a little monkey women… you’re lean and you’re mean, and you’re not too far in between…
“Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.”