Mel Gibson Cast In New Family Movie
Defying expectations, Mel Gibson has been cast in an upcoming family film!
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There was a time when it looked like we’d seen the beginning of the end of Mel Gibson’s time in Hollywood. But these days it seems like the controversial, Oscar-winning actor and director has a schedule that’s as full as it ever was. In spite of enduring allegations of racism, antisemitism, homophobia, and domestic abuse for over a decade, the man who brought us 1995’s Braveheart has just been cast in a fun family adventure film.
The news of Mel Gibson’s casting comes from Deadline, who reports the new film is Boys of Summer; presumably named for the 1984 single by Don Henley. The name of Gibson’s character isn’t known yet, though he will apparently be playing an “aging detective.” Mason Thames (The Black Phone) will play the young Noah, who enlists the aid of Gibson’s character after his best friend disappears. The film is set in Martha’s Vineyard, where Noah is convinced some kind of supernatural being is hunting children. Together, Noah and Gibson’s detective discover that their quarry is a witch who has retired nearby.
Boys of Summer will be directed by David Henrie, who made his directorial debut last year with the teen dramedy This Is the Year. Writing the dialogue for Mel Gibson and his costars are Bryan Schulz and Cornelius Uliano, who previously collaborated on 2015’s The Peanuts Movie. No release date has been announced.
Mel Gibson’s entertainment career certainly looks a lot better than it did in the aughts and early 2010’s. After a 2006 DUI arrest, during which Gibson made antisemitic remarks, things got worse and worse for his prospects. In 2010 Radar Online released audio tapes of Gibson threatening his former girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, admitting to hitting her, and making racist remarks.
By the late aughts, Mel Gibson’s fellow actors were turning away from him. Gibson was originally cast to play a Bangkok tattoo artist in 2011’s The Hangover Part II, but his part was eventually cut because of the demands of members of the cast and crew, including Zach Galifianakis. In 2010 Leonardo DiCaprio exited Gibson’s still unmade Viking epic Berserker, and Radar Online — the same site that leaked the damning Gibson phone recordings — reported that inside sources close to DiCaprio confirmed it was Gibson’s involvement that inspired Leo to say thanks, but no thanks. Just last year, Stranger Things star Winona Ryder talked to Variety about hateful comments she’d allegedly heard Gibson use, including a horrifically ugly antisemitic remark he allegedly directed at Ryder.
But apparently Hollywood’s penalty box has a time limit, because Mel Gibson is once again showing up on our big and small screens. In 2014 he boarded the cinematic action star clown car known as the Expendables franchise with The Expendables 3. Earlier this year he played the villain in the time-looping Hulu original Boss Level. Perhaps most surprisingly, as the John Wick franchise is set to expand not only to more sequels and spin-off movies, but into TV series as well, the creative minds behind the franchise have tapped Gibson for the upcoming show The Continental.
