You say you want a revolution...
During my historical podcast hopings, I came across one that in its Q & A sessions suggested his dream cast for a multi season lengthy HBO style series on the French Revolution: Timothee Chalamet as St Just, a younger Tom Hanks or Bradley Cooper type as Louis XVI ("someone who can be both sympathetic and frustrating at the same time"), Anthony Hopkins as Mirabeau, Christan Bale as Marat, Henry Cavill as Lafayette and Adam Driver as Camille Desmoulins, with Margot Robbie as Marie Antoinette. The podcaster had no idea whom to cast as Robespierre which frustrated him. Now, I can see all of these (though Hopkins is too old for Mirabeau by now, and for that matter everyone other than Chalamet is pushing it, age wise - Louis and Marie Antoinette were both in their mid to later 30s when they were executed). and the key prominent revolutionaries other than Marat and Mirabeau were in their early 30s when they died as well. I think it's in Mantel's Place of Greater Safety that someone observes that many of the lead revolutionaries being nearly all relatively young (lawyers, most of them) when rising to power, with no practical experience in death, has a lot to do with how the Terror came to be.
(BTW, there's now a trailer for a new movie about Napoleon by Ridley Scott, starring Joaquin Phoenix as N. Bonaparte. On the one hand, can totally see the casting, and also, the two worked well together before in Gladiator. Otoh, Joaquin Phoenix while right for Emperor Napoleon in his downfall years is too old now for young Bonaparte on the rise in the final years of the Revolution, and the age does matter in how he came across to his contemporaries.)
Anyway, back to the podcaster's dream casting for a multi season Game of Revolution: I think Bale as Marat would be a great choice, and Chalamet having a go as Antoine "Angel of Death" Saint-Juste should be worth seeing, but I'm going back and thro on Driver as Desmoulins. I mean, acting wise, sure, but he's a bit too athletic? Then again, many actors hit the gym regularly for professional reasons, resulting in a body shape an 18th century guy who isn't a soldier would not have had. And of course Margot Robbie could both the frivolity and the strength in adversity. But I do think that a multi season series on the French Revolution should go with younger actors in all the main parts, letting them age along with the seasons, and reserve the established stars for cameos (i.e. parts for people who are only around briefly), thus preserving the poignancy - and making it more difficult for people not already familiar with the French Revolution to know who's going to be prominent, who is doomed and who'll make it out alive despite the odds. Also, of course: Olympe de Gouges and the female revolutionaries should get actual appearances and roles beyond "briefly mentioned" (if mentioned at all). I would say "also General Alex Dumas", but that depends on where you do the cut off point - the two most common ones are eitherh Thermidor because of the death of Robespierre and the end of the Terror (though by no means the end of purges and bloody weeks - they just came from non-left corners thereafter), or some years later Brumaire (Napeolon goes from General to First Consul Bonaparte). If the former, then there's not enough narrative space, if the later, absolutely.
Because of how important rumors and paranoia and the urgent belief in conspiracies were to people of all ideological persuasions, it could be a very timely series in many respects, but I bet there would also be a lot of fannish fury once the cast starts to get killed off at an increasing pace. And I can just hear the complaint about former fan favourites like Lafayette suddenly holding the idiot ball to get the plot where it's meant to be, and/or acting ooc (Champs du Mars massacre, cough).
On an unrelated note, here's a good article about Victorian writer Wilkie Collins. From which I learned that when Wilkie was in a health crisis, his bff Dickens offered to finish No-Name for him so Wilkie could make the deadline. (Collins declined.) Dickens swore he could do it in a way so readers wouldn't notice a difference. Honestly, I doubt it. Dickens was in many respects the superior writer, but not when it came to female characters. Especially those between 20 and 40. I don't think the main one from No Name would have made it out of her novel in a relatively happy ending if written by Dickens, or at least not without emigrating to Aiustralia. And I can't see Lydia Gwilt (from Armadale writing her snarky diary entries in a Dickens novel.
(BTW, there's now a trailer for a new movie about Napoleon by Ridley Scott, starring Joaquin Phoenix as N. Bonaparte. On the one hand, can totally see the casting, and also, the two worked well together before in Gladiator. Otoh, Joaquin Phoenix while right for Emperor Napoleon in his downfall years is too old now for young Bonaparte on the rise in the final years of the Revolution, and the age does matter in how he came across to his contemporaries.)
Anyway, back to the podcaster's dream casting for a multi season Game of Revolution: I think Bale as Marat would be a great choice, and Chalamet having a go as Antoine "Angel of Death" Saint-Juste should be worth seeing, but I'm going back and thro on Driver as Desmoulins. I mean, acting wise, sure, but he's a bit too athletic? Then again, many actors hit the gym regularly for professional reasons, resulting in a body shape an 18th century guy who isn't a soldier would not have had. And of course Margot Robbie could both the frivolity and the strength in adversity. But I do think that a multi season series on the French Revolution should go with younger actors in all the main parts, letting them age along with the seasons, and reserve the established stars for cameos (i.e. parts for people who are only around briefly), thus preserving the poignancy - and making it more difficult for people not already familiar with the French Revolution to know who's going to be prominent, who is doomed and who'll make it out alive despite the odds. Also, of course: Olympe de Gouges and the female revolutionaries should get actual appearances and roles beyond "briefly mentioned" (if mentioned at all). I would say "also General Alex Dumas", but that depends on where you do the cut off point - the two most common ones are eitherh Thermidor because of the death of Robespierre and the end of the Terror (though by no means the end of purges and bloody weeks - they just came from non-left corners thereafter), or some years later Brumaire (Napeolon goes from General to First Consul Bonaparte). If the former, then there's not enough narrative space, if the later, absolutely.
Because of how important rumors and paranoia and the urgent belief in conspiracies were to people of all ideological persuasions, it could be a very timely series in many respects, but I bet there would also be a lot of fannish fury once the cast starts to get killed off at an increasing pace. And I can just hear the complaint about former fan favourites like Lafayette suddenly holding the idiot ball to get the plot where it's meant to be, and/or acting ooc (Champs du Mars massacre, cough).
On an unrelated note, here's a good article about Victorian writer Wilkie Collins. From which I learned that when Wilkie was in a health crisis, his bff Dickens offered to finish No-Name for him so Wilkie could make the deadline. (Collins declined.) Dickens swore he could do it in a way so readers wouldn't notice a difference. Honestly, I doubt it. Dickens was in many respects the superior writer, but not when it came to female characters. Especially those between 20 and 40. I don't think the main one from No Name would have made it out of her novel in a relatively happy ending if written by Dickens, or at least not without emigrating to Aiustralia. And I can't see Lydia Gwilt (from Armadale writing her snarky diary entries in a Dickens novel.