Michael Sheen Returns To Vampire Land For Twilight
Michael Sheenplayed Lucian, leader of the Lycans in not one, not two but threeUnderworldfilms – two of which I can personally identify as being particularly tedious, the third of which I’m passively avoiding. Now he’s set to switch sides and head up the Vampires as Aro, boss of the fangsters inNew Moon,Chris Weitz’sTwilightsequel.The Daily Mailgot the story and a quote from Weitz to back it up:
Weitz is definitely a more interesting and talented director than his brother, and his ‘active pursuit’ of Sheen is a class play. He’s taking this film seriously when it would be so easy not to. Any shortcomings ofThe Golden Compasswere not through Weitz' sincerity and hard work.
Aro doesn’tseemto be one of the main characters inNew Moon– fans of the ‘saga’, please fill in the blanks in the comments – but he does seem set to recur in future installments. Weitz has done a favour for whatever director takes over the franchise with film three by getting Sheen on board.
We in the UK have been fortunate enough to receive a good hunk of Sheen already this year with Tom Hooper’s excellentThe Damned United. That’s one of Sheen’s biopics, and adds notorious football manager Brian Clough to a gallery of real-life roles that’s probably extensive enough to earn him a mention in the Guinness Book of Records. Here are the others, by my count: Robbie Ross inWilde; Tony Blair inThe DealandThe Queen(and, soon,The Special Relationship); Jeremy Dyson inThe League of Gentlemen’s Apocalypse; Kenneth Williams inFantabulosa; Nero inAncient Rome: The Rise and Fall of an Empire; HG Wells inHG Wells: War With the World; and David Frost inFrost/Nixon.
I’m always impressed by that list. I’m curious how deliberate it is that Sheen has ended up playing so many biographical characterisations. He seems to suggest it’s accidental, but this score seems way outside of any random roll of the roles. At the very least, this constitutes the most flexible flavour of typecasting I’ve ever seen.
