Freddie Mercury One of the best recent examples of spot-on bio-pic casting has dissolved with the announcement that Sacha Baron Cohen has pulled out of portraying the late, gay superstar Freddie Mercury. Baron Cohen had seemed the perfect fit to play Mercury, the over the top front-man of rock mega-band Queen. However, he is understood to want the movie to concentrate on the period of Queen and Mercury's ascent to global adulation and their appearance in the 1985 Live Aid concert. Sacha Baron Cohen This period coincided with a time in his life during which Mercury was indulging heavily in drugs and frequent 'organised' encounters with out of it young men, particularly in New York. Mercury himself referred to this period, saying "When I go there I just go overboard... It's sin city... very hypnotic." It is understood the remaining members of the supergroup are against the idea as it would draw attention to the influence on Mercury's life of the associate who supplied him with the drugs and young men. "The less said about him the better," Queen drummer Roger Taylor has told the BBC. Of his legacy, Mercury is alleged to have told his manager, on his deathbed, "You can do what you want with my music, just don't make me boring." Mercury kept his HIV infection secret until his final dying days, he passed away in 1991 after a long fight against AIDS.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Monday, 29th July 2013 - 11:53am