Yer a Weirdo, Harry: Daniel Radcliffe to Star as Weird Al Yankovic in New Biopic
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Since his days at Hogwarts, Daniel Radcliffe has dedicated his career to quirky indie movies rather than Potteresque blockbusters—and now it looks like he’s found his weirdest character to date.
Radcliffe is set to star as “Weird Al” Yankovic in the upcoming biopic Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, according to The Hollywood Reporter, in an upcoming feature co-written by Yankovic himself.
In an announcement Tuesday, the beloved parodist said: “When my last movie UHF came out in 1989, I made a solemn vow to my fans that I would release a major motion picture every 33 years, like clockwork. I’m very happy to say we’re on schedule... And I am absolutely thrilled that Daniel Radcliffe will be portraying me in the film. I have no doubt whatsoever that this is the role future generations will remember him for.”
The Yankovic movie is set to start filming in Los Angeles next month and will be released exclusively on the Roku channel. It was co-written by Eric Appel, who will also direct the feature. He commented: “When Weird Al first sat me down against my will and told me his life story, I didn’t believe any of it, but I knew that we had to make a movie about it.”
Roku’s head of original scripted programming, Colin Davis, said: “There clearly aren’t enough biopic movies about famous musicians and we were excited to shine a light on the incredibly true, unexaggerated story of Weird Al... This is sincerely the ultimate combination of talent, creativity, and friends, coming together to make something genuinely funny and we could not be prouder to call this film a Roku Original.”
Radcliffe hasn’t commented on his new role, but he’s made clear in the past that, when it comes to choosing his characters, he likes to get weird.
Speaking to Empire last year, he said: “I’ve actually found it’s an incredibly liberating thing to do the biggest thing you’re ever going to do really fucking early... The financial success thing, that’s done. So just do things that make you happy... Like, for every director out there that was like, ‘I can only see him as Harry Potter,’ there was at least one that said, ‘I wonder if he’ll do this really fucking weird thing?’ And I did!”
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