Remember when Mel Gibson was fun, before he went all drunk crazy religious fanatic mean like? Can fun Mel ever come back?
In the last six years, Mel Gibson has been in the headlines for just about anything except acting. He directed The Passion of the Christ, which generated tons of uproar and even more money, and Apocalypto, which generated less of both. Along the way he picked up a highly publicized DUI that was punctuated by an anti-Semitic rant and salacious comments directed at a female police officer.
But the Mel man has always been a moneymaker and despite all the controversy surrounding him, has apparently continued to be offered acting roles. Now, according to Variety, he’s accepted one. Gibson will star in a big screen adaptation of a 1985 BBC miniseries, Edge of Darkness. William Monahan, Oscar winner for writing The Departed, will write the screenplay and Casino Royale director Martin Campbell will, well, direct.
Graham King will produce for his GK Films, with the BBC and original miniseries producer Michael Wearing also involved. King was one of the producers of The Departed, hence the Monahan connection. King’s committed to an August start date, which means busy Monahan, who’s also supposedly on several other projects, better be working on this screenplay right now, as I type this.
Gibson supposedly was a fan of the miniseries, thus his interest in it when he was approached. He’ll play a “straitlaced police investigator” who discovers a morass of corruption while investigating the death of his activist daughter.
Will Gibson’s troubles hurt the box office for the movie? I would guess not. First off, if proven stars haven’t been able to turn weak movies into hits, then it stands to reason that a star with some personal negatives can’t destroy a good film (IF this one is good. Big if). Also, it’s been a few years now since the DUI and so many other celebrity scandals have broken since then. Finally, even if it does have some effect in the US, chances are good that none of Gibson’s missteps have been big enough to derail him internationally, and that’s a big part of the box office.
No word on other cast members or anything like that. They could try changing the title to Darkness on the Edge of Town, and pick up a built in Springsteen theme song.
