Jay Leno’s Big Return To Acting Is Seeing Another Setback
Jay Leno's acting comeback may face a few more hurdles!
This article is more than 2 years old
Jay Leno is widely known for his long-running stint as the host of The Tonight Show before it was taken over by Jimmy Fallon in 2013. But Leno is also known to dip his toes in the acting world every once in a while. His last live-action movie role where he played someone other than himself was The Flintstones in 1994. Unfortunately, it looks like his big acting return has been delayed even further.
Leno is set to co-star in Midas Man, an upcoming biopic about the late Beatles manager Brian Epstein (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd). The movie will depict Epstein’s influence on the band and his role in their meteoric rise to prominence in the 1960s. Fans of the Beatles will be familiar with one of their most famous moments — their performance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Jay Leno will be portraying Ed Sullivan, so it looks like he’ll be comfortably within his acting wheelhouse.
While the movie will certainly be a treat for Beatles fans, it’s been plagued with production setbacks. The first setback was when the original director, Jonas Akerlund, and some of the crew parted ways with the project. Production was supposed to resume in late November, but it has now been pushed to late January. Some rumors indicate that the push in schedule is due to a funding issue, but the production company themselves have come out and stated that there are no issues with the production or the scheduling.
Director Sara Sugarman is now helming the project. Along with Jacob Fortune-Lloyd and Jay Leno, the film will also star Blake Richardson as Paul McCartney, Jonah Lees as John Lennon, Leo Harvey Elledge as George Harrison, and Campbell Wallace as Ringo Starr. Emily Watson, Lukas Gage, Bill Milner, Eddie Marsan, and Rosie Day co-star. The film is being produced by StudioPow and Trevor Beattie Films with Sunny Vohra and Nicola Pearcey serving as executive producers. The screen story was penned by Brigit Grant and adapted by Jonathan Wakeman.
Since the production company seems confident with the scheduling, it looks like there might not be too much to worry about. In the meantime, fans of the Beatles have plenty to keep them occupied. The Peter Jackson documentary Get Back revitalized old footage of the Beatles recording what would be their last album, Let It Be. The nearly eight-hour documentary gives an unprecedented look into the creative process of one of the biggest bands of all time, as well as their interpersonal interactions when they were on the precipice of breaking up. By this time of the Beatles’ career, Brian Epstein had passed away. Midas Man will give us a very different look at the Beatles since we’ll be seeing the earliest part of their journey, their relationship with Epstein, and their debut on the world stage with Jay Leno’s Ed Sullivan.
As of now, there is no hard release date for Midas Man. It’s slated to come out sometime in 2022, assuming there aren’t any more production delays. It looks like we’ll just have to wait and see when we can enjoy Jay Leno’s return to the silver screen.
