Joaquin is in the magazineTotal Film UK - June 2003 - Page 25

 

- Main picture: Joaquin with guitar, caption: Country cousin: Phoenix to star as iconic Cash alongside Witherspoon (right).

 

"Cashing In - Joaquin Phoenix tunes up to play singing legend..."

 

Country music icon Johnny Cash may not be down wit da kids, but Joaquin Phoenix is set to play the Man In Black in a big-screen biopic. Not an obvious choice, but Phoenix has the charisma and arrogance to embody the fire-and-brimstone-breathing basso profundo. He also bears a passing resemblance to the singer in the his '60s period.

 

Walk The Line is shaping up to be an unconventional project.  Reese Witherspoon is another off-kilter casting choice, with the Legally Blonde star switching into Serious Actress Mode to play Cash's second wife and fellow band member, June Carter. The movie, due to shoot in the autumn, will focus on Cash's rise from humble origins in the '30s, to being a founding father of country.

 

Musician biopics aren't renowned for setting the box office alight, and it's hard to imagine a bug market for this. But Cash remains an idiosyncratic, fearless and enormously popular figure: at one point in 1969, he was outselling The Beatles. Girl, Interrupted director James Mangold is the man wielding the megaphone. A long-time Cash fan, he's persuaded the big man to grant access to his personal archives. What with Todd Haynes' in-development Bob Dylan biopic, 2004 is shaping up to be the year of cinematic musical oddities.

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