This news is a bit late hitting the film blog world, considering FearNet's Jen Yamato managed to hide it inside an interview with Wyck Godfrey from the "Eclipse" press junket posted on June 13 (sorry that we're guilty too, Jen, but kudos to you for getting this scoop a month before Deadline). Unfortunately, when Nikki Finke wrote her post to confirm that Amy Adams would indeed be playing Janis Joplin in a biopic, she failed to realize that the FearNet article was actually posted a month and two days before her own, not that same day as Nikki reported.
Scoop discrepancies behind, we have to admit we think Amy is a surprising choice to play the late, great female rocker. We don't have our doubts that Amy will be able to pull off an edgy enough performance to capture Janis' life, it's just… well, wasn't there anyone else who could have better played the part?
The biggest problem with casting Amy as Janis is that she's too pretty. She's America's sweetheart, for goodness sake, and while we appreciate the fact that she is expanding her acting to roles that won't be necessarily easy for her, this casting still feels a little off. Please don't read that the wrong way, because we love Amy Adams and think she is a phenomenal actress who can handle whatever is put in front of her (e.g. "Junebug," "Doubt," "Sunshine Cleaning" and "Cruel Intentions 2" — haha!), but we don't like the idea of having to tone-down Amy, or pretty-up Janis. Plus, while Amy has proved she has a great voice for showtunes, we don't know if she has the chops for Janis.
Public opinion seems to be that Pink would have played a much better Janis Joplin, since she actually had already had a screen test to play the rocker for a different project. We could picture that a lot more than Amy as Janis, or someone like "American Idol" runner-up Crystal Bowersox, who already proved she had the voice to belt out Janis Joplin's tunes.
We're interested to see what Amy will be able to bring to the role, and would love to see Amy in Janis costume to prove to audiences that she can look the part. With the casting decision causing some controversy, that — and audio of Amy performing a Janis tune — might be what we next see coming out of this project.
Do you think Amy Adams will be able to play a good Janis Joplin?
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