Grab your kite and bifocals: Michael Douglas to play Benjamin Franklin on Apple TV Plus series
The series will be about his eight-year diplomatic mission to France
Aux News Franklin
Watch out, Andy Daly: Your one-episode role on The Office may soon no longer be the definitive pop culture portrayal of Benjamin Franklin. That’s because Apple has just announced that Michael Douglas, best known these days as Hank Pym in the Marvel movies and the guy they cut to at awards shows when they talk about something called The Kominsky Method, has signed on to play the founding father for a limited series on Apple TV+.
The show doesn’t have a title yet, but it’s coming from John Adams’ Kirk Ellis and will be directed by Tim Van Patten (The Sopranos), so any additional information is superfluous. This thing is going to get some nominations no matter what it’s called with a pedigree like that. But if you absolutely need more information, a press release from Apple says it will be about Franklin’s dealings in France, when—“without any diplomatic training”—he convinced the monarchy to “underwrite America’s experiment in democracy.”
The press release adds that this eight-year mission “stands as Franklin’s most vital service to his country, without which America would not have won the Revolution,” and he did it while having sex-filled adventures throughout Europe! How many other Americans can say the same about whatever service they’ve done for this country?
As for Douglas, he seems to have aged into the sweet spot for playing older Americans involved in important diplomatic missions. In addition to playing Franklin, he’s still attached to play Ronald Reagan for a limited series about the 1986 Reykjavík Summit in which the U.S. President and Soviet General Secreatary Mikhail Gorbachev discussed how to bring about the end of the Cold War. Christoph Waltz was attached to play Gorbachev, but we haven’t heard about this project in a year. It’ll be interesting to see if… current events impact its viability.
12 Comments
Did Ben Franklin really have to do that much convincing? I always imagined his time in France was basically “Hey, fuck George III, right? So… where those French courtesans at?”
Don’t forget wearing a rustic racoon-skin hat to make him look like s rustic American pioneer — despite the fact that he lived in Philadelphia, which was kind of like the NYC of the 18th century (NYC of course existed then, but culturally it was a minor city compared to Philadelphia and Boston).
SO we’ll get a tasteful glimpse of Benjamin Franklin’s ass?
Yep. And there’s already talk that Michael Douglas’s balls are being considered for the 2023 SAG awards.
Nice!
KINJA CAFFEINE SPIDER, ARE YOU TALKING TO THE FOUNDING FATHERS AGAIN?!Also, can you have your slave press my suit?
Timothy Busfield’s portrayal of Benjamin Franklin on Sleepy Hollow was the only one I’ll ever need.
I could swear this already happened in like 2009
I Katherine Zeta Jones going to play a sexy Mrs. Franklin? “I call them bifocals. I can see both far away and close up” [stares longingly into Mrs. Franklin’s bosom]
That could work depending on when the scene was set. Franklin was quite devoted to his wife. He only got the reputation as a ladies’ man after he became a widower.
Considering the popularity and success of the musical Hamilton, shouldn’t the role have gone to someone, oh I don’t know, more of “color” than pasty-faced Michael Douglas? Someone deep and dark and far more African-looking than Mr. I Couldn’t Be More White If I Tried? I mean, we’re at the stage when reality means nothing now, only diversity and persons of color getting all the roles that matter, right? I’m so confused.
Jim Cummings as Amos or we revolt.