With director Mary Harron‘s American Psycho recently celebrating its 25th anniversary, the team behind the cult-favorite film tells The Hollywood Reporter their initial impressions of Luca Guadagnino‘s plan to take a stab at a new feature.
Hitting theaters from Lionsgate on April 14, 2000, American Psycho stars Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman, a banker with murderous fantasies, in the adaptation of author Bret Easton Ellis’ best-selling novel satirizing 1980s yuppie culture. Lionsgate has recently announced that Guadagnino is attached to helm a new take on the book with a script from Scott Z. Burns, and the director himself appeared via video at CinemaCon earlier this month to tease the project.
“On one hand, I am always sad about remakes,” says actor Matt Ross, who plays a co-worker of Bateman’s in the 2000 feature and also works as a filmmaker. “I personally have been offered them in the past as a director, and I’ve been very reticent to engage in that because it always feels like just mercenary capitalism and nothing else.” For its part, Lionsgate has noted that Guadagnino’s project is aiming to offer a new vision of the book, rather than remaking the movie.
Ross goes on to call Guadagnino “a wonderful filmmaker” and acknowledges that having the new movie use the book as source material suggests that it could be approached in the way that Shakespearean productions empower new generations of actors to tackle juicy roles. “That still feels like a business venture more than anything else, but being that it’s based on a book, there can be multiple interpretations, so why not?” Ross continues. “I think they have their work cut out for them, for no other reason than Christian’s performance is exceptional.”
Chris Hanley, who produced the 2000 movie, notes that revisiting popular intellectual property is the name of the game in Hollywood. After all, Hanley points out that he is still hoping to do a follow-up to Spring Breakers, the 2012 crime film to which he holds the rights, despite director Harmony Korine not wanting to be involved. “Everybody’s calling me, going like, ‘How stupid to make [American Psycho],’” Hanley says. “I’m not like that.” He adds, “Luca is a great director. He’s never made a bad movie.”
During his CinemaCon video segment, Guadagnino shared that Ellis’ 1991 book is one “that I deeply love, that is something that influenced me so much.” The filmmaker behind such projects as Queer and Challengers also teased, “The script is coming out very handsomely.” There was no mention of any casting choices, although rumors circulated late last year about Austin Butler being eyed for the lead.
Casting director Kerry Barden, who worked on the 2000 film, sees Butler as potentially a better fit for the role of Paul Allen, who was played by Jared Leto in Harron’s movie. “I would cast Austin in Jared’s role because he’s that beautiful, and that’s why we cast Jared, is because he’s that beautiful,” Barden says. “Jared is certainly a great actor as well, and obviously, Austin has a lot of depth as an actor, too. But not every person has that kind of beauty.”
Alessandro Camon, who co-produced the Bale-led movie, is aligned with his former colleagues in respecting Guadagnino’s artistry and being curious about his plan.
“It’s a big challenge when anybody remakes a movie that is iconic or takes on a role that is iconic,” says Camon. “But sometimes for actors, that is also exciting. Of course, Laurence Olivier is the Hamlet, but it’s not about, ‘How do I better Lawrence Olivier?’ It’s about, ‘How do I find my own Hamlet?’”