Benjamin Walker Freed the Slaves & Fought the Undead
Fri, January 28, 2011 
20th Century Fox made the call to go in the "unknown" direction instead of more name-recognized actors like Adrian Brody or Eric Bana for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. The trades report Benjamin Walker will star in Timur Bekmambetov's film version of the popular (for some reason) novel by Seth Graham-Smith as Honest Abe.
The classically-trained Broadway actor, currently starring in Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson and future son-in-law to Meryl Streep of all people, had an almost claim to fame last summer. He was cast as Hank McCoy/Beast for X-Men: First Class. But issues of his age arose (He looked too old to be taking lessons from James McAvoy, executives argued) and he was ousted, but paid for his time.
Then after a fruitless search for a replacement (prior to the casting of Nicholas Hoult) they actually went back to the guy with a brand new contract. He understandably turned it down.
But that all looks like water under the bridge.
Maybe if this is a big hit next June, someone will pick-up my Anne Frank: Zombie Killer idea?
Reader Comments