Well this will certainly be a change of pace for actor we’re used to seeing wearing a hoodie and saying “Bitch” more often and better than anyone. Ridley Scott‘s “Exodus” is ramping up its casting and has an interesting slate of names coming aboard.
Deadline reports that Aaron Paul, Ben Kingsley, John Turturro and Sigourney Weaver (reteaming with her “Alien” and “1492: Conquest Of Paradise” director) are all on board the Bible flick that’s already set to star Christian Bale and Joel Edgerton. Penned by Adam Cooper and Bill Collage, with a rewrite from Steve Zaillian, the film is a new take on the life of Moses, one that will include his sibling style relationship with Ramses, and apparently a bit more Jesus Christ than previously seen too. As for this new batch, Weaver and Tuturro will play the parents of Ramses, with Kingsley as a scholar and Paul as Joshua, the man who leads the Israelites after the death of Moses into the promised land of Canaan (which Moses had sent Joshua to spy on first).
So yeah, this is certainly some… interesting… casting. Meanwhile, Paul is keeping busy. “Breaking Bad” is in the rearview, “Need For Speed” drops early next year and the actor is also keeping one foot in indie territory, recently revealing on his show’s podcast that he’s working on another flick.
“It’s a film called ‘Hellion,’ it’s the same producing team that did ‘Take Shelter‘ and ‘Mud‘ and it’s their next project. It surrounds this family and this emotionally absent father who is trying to raise these two boys alone because he lost his wife in a tragic car accident a year before the story starts. It’s a 10 year old and a 13 year old and I play the father trying to raise these two boys. The 13 year old misses his mom and doesn’t really have a father because he’s not there raising him so he’s just a hellion. He’s lighting cars on fire, completely out there and it looks like he’s going to drag his younger brother down with him, this sweet young innocent boy. So the younger boy gets taken away and put into the system because the house that he’s being raised in is just not a good place to be raised in. And the story is really a father desperately trying to get his boy back and tame his oldest son. It’s a beautiful story.”
The film is being directed by Kat Candler (her feature debut based on her own short), with Juliette Lewis in a supporting role. No word on when that might arrive, but “Exodus” lands on December 12, 2014.
Actors of fully Jewish background: Logan Lerman, Natalie Portman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Mila Kunis, Bar Refaeli, James Wolk, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Julian Morris, Adam Brody, Esti Ginzburg, Kat Dennings, Gabriel Macht, Erin Heatherton, Odeya Rush, Anton Yelchin, Paul Rudd, Scott Mechlowicz, Lisa Kudrow…
Kat Candler has directed a feature before called Jumping Off Bridges. Just a correction that Hellion is not her feature debut.
Couldn't they get a cast of people who at least look Egyptian or Hebrew? So sad.
Love Ridley, but I'm increasingly puzzled by this casting. Aren't there enough actors of color out there? You could cast this movie out of the extraordinary actors in The Reluctant Fundamentalist, for example.
Interesting that not a single Jewish actor has been cast in this version of what may be the most important story in Judaism. And I don't buy a single one of these actors — with the exception of Ben Kingsley — as either a Middle Eastern Jew nor an Egyptian.