As part of a 40th Anniversary celebration of the band’s 1976 debut album, Billboard is reporting that Martin Scorsese is attached to direct a biopic on the iconic punk rock band the Ramones.
The last surviving member of the band Tommy Ramone passed away last month, and now their manager of their estate, Jeff Jampol, intends to focus on the band’s complete legacy, planning a book, documentary, play and remastered music.
Scorsese is the type of director who would be an excellent choice for just about any project, but he has the musical background with concert films The Last Waltz (The Band), No Direction Home (Bob Dylan), Shine a Light (The Rolling Stones), and documentary George Harrison: Living in the Material World, as well as plans for a biopic on Frank Sinatra.
Currently Scorsese is in pre-production on Silence, a drama about two Jesuit priests in the 17th Century starring Andrew Garfield and Liam Neeson, another untitled rock ‘n roll project he’s making with Terence Winter for HBO, and a just announced HBO spinoff of Shutter Island called Ashecliffe
Now the inevitable question for any biopic is casting. Perhaps Scorsese could poach John Magaro away from David Chase following Magaro’s starring role in Not Fade Away. And I’d love to see an old age Ramone brother played by Sean Penn back in full This Must Be the Place makeup.
Of course, let’s not forget that The Ramones already have a proper biopic in the form of the, ahem, timeless classic Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, in which the band helps blow up a school and somewhat strangely serenades an adoring teenage fan in her bathroom.
No other details of the project have been made available, but it’s presumed the project will be shooting for 2016 in alignment with the band’s anniversary.
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