Mario Van Peebles has been tapped to direct “That’ll Be the Day,” the story of how Buddy Holly and different musicians of the late Nineteen Fifties helped give delivery to rock ‘n’ roll and affect the broader societal and cultural panorama, together with the civil rights motion.
Music has been central to a lot of Van Peebles’ work, from his 1991 gangster film “New Jack Metropolis” to his work on “Wu-Tang: An American Saga,” which he co-executive produced for Hulu. Van Peebles is at present writing a musical stage tribute to his father Melvin Van Peebles, to be carried out at New York Metropolis’s Lincoln Middle later this yr.
“America’s tumultuous cultural melting pot has produced transcendent musical expertise, together with Buddy Holly, who was our first unhealthy ass rock ’n’ roll nerd,” Van Peebles stated in an announcement.
His 2003 docudrama “Baadasssss!” pays homage to his father’s groundbreaking movie “Candy Sweetback’s Baadasssss Track.” His newest movie, “Outlaw Posse” – a Western starring Edward James Olmos, Whoopi Goldberg, Cedric the Entertainer and John Caroll Lynch – which Van Peebles wrote, directed and starred in – is out now in theaters.
The producers of “That’ll Be the Day” are Rick French (“Not With out Hope,” “4 Down”) of Prix Productions and Stuart Benjamin (“Ray,” “La Bamba”) of Stuart Benjamin Productions, working in collaboration with STX.
The screenplay was written by Patrick Shanahan and Matthew Benjamin, with further materials written by Van Peebles. The script relies on a narrative by French and Stephen Easley, normal counsel to the Buddy Holly Instructional Basis.
BMG – which manages the Buddy Holly property and controls the rights to the Holly music publishing catalog within the U.S. – supplied improvement funding for the venture. Easley, David Hirshland and Peter Bradley, Jr. of the Buddy Holly Instructional Basis are govt producers. Maria Elena Holly, widow of Buddy Holly, is an affiliate producer. Shanahan and Matthew Benjamin are co-producers. Annie Herndon is overseeing the venture for STX.
Benjamin has a protracted historical past with musical biopics. In 1987, he produced the music drama “La Bamba,” starring Lou Diamond Phillips, which chronicled the rise of a younger Ritchie Valens, who died together with Holly and J.P. Richardson (The Massive Bopper) in a airplane crash close to Clear Lake, Iowa on Feb. 3, 1959. Benjamin later produced “Ray,” a biopic that explored the life and profession of Ray Charles, which starred Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington and Regina King. He obtained an Oscar nomination for the movie and likewise took dwelling a Grammy for the movie’s soundtrack.
