James Marsden wants to play Frank Sinatra in a biopic.
“I’ve always loved emulating some of the old crooners, like Bobby Darin and Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin,” Marsden told the New York Post this week. “I always thought there were so many interesting stories of Frank Sinatra’s life that could be played. And for whatever reason, you’ve never really seen a movie about him.”
To be fair, Ray Liotta played Sinatra in 1998’s made-for-television movie The Rat Pack, James Russo played him in Stealing Sinatra, also made for TV (released in 2003, the movie covers the 1963 kidnapping of the singer’s famous son), Dennis Hopper played him in 2003’s The Night We Call It a Day, about Sinatra’s 1963 Australia tour, and Robert Knepper played him in 2012’s My Way, about the life of French singer Claude François.
But Marsden is still kind of right — there has yet to be a blockbuster biopic for Sinatra to rival those made in recent years for Johnny Cash (Walk The Line), Ray Charles (Ray), Elvis (Elvis), Freddie Mercury (Bohemian Rhapsody) and Bob Dylan (A Complete Unknown).
“To do a biopic like what Jamie Foxx did with Ray Charles would be a lot of fun,” Marsden said. “I would love to. And you’re actually using your singing voice, as well.”
Marsden also used his singing voice in 2007’s Enchanted and 2007’s Hairspray. “It was like we were doing a Broadway show on stage for a couple of months,” Marsden said of the latter. “It was great…a joyous experience.”
The Paradise actor went on to say, “I just think there’s so many stories that could be told about [Sinatra] – some of the really tortured and darker stories, and some uplifting ones as well. What he did, what he accomplished. I’ve never really done a biopic about somebody.”