Weird Al wanted Daniel Radcliffe to play him on screen because of his versatility.
Weird Al on choosing Daniel Radcliffe to play him on screen
The 63-year-old musician’s life has been turned into a new biopic and he revealed that he ended up choosing ‘Harry Potter’ star Daniel, 33, to play him on-screen because of his ability to do drama and comedy after deciding from a list of a dozen actors.
He said: “Eric and I were sitting around, and we were trying to figure out who would be a good person to play me in the movie. And we generated a list of maybe half a dozen or so actors that we thought could pull it off. And the name that we kept focusing on was Daniel’s, because we just thought that he had the right attitude and the right energy for the movie. Daniel is amazing at comedic acting as well as dramatic acting.
The ‘Dare to be Stupid’ hitmaker – who has made a career out of writing and producing music that makes fun of popular culture – went on to explain that the sort of versatility Daniel could offer was “definitely needed” for the project and is “thrilled” that he could commit to the part in the first place.
He told Variety: “We definitely needed somebody who could do both. Because even though it’s a comedy, we don’t play it like a comedy. We play it like a very, very serious Oscar-worthy Hollywood biopic. And Daniel had to be able to pull off those dramatic moments, which he does. We’re both thrilled that Daniel was open to doing the role. And as we predicted, he absolutely nailed it."
‘Weird: The Al Yankovic Story’ is available to stream now on The Roku Channel.
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