Posted by | Ray Cornelius
Universal Pictures has released a sneak peek photo of Chadwick Boseman as the Godfather of Soul, James Brown in the upcoming biopic titled Get On Up. The picture, which first appeared on Entertainment Weekly.com, shows Boseman behind the mic and rocking Brown’s signature pompadour hair do. Also featured is comedic actor Craig Robinson as one of Brown’s musicians.
The highly anticipated film is directed by The Help’s Tate Taylor, who explained to EW that Get On Up will not hold back from showing Brown’s dark side.
“As I dug in and started to discover more about him, the good and the bad, I loved the reasons he was often bad and I loved the reasons he was good. I love that he would stop at nothing to keep reinventing himself so he could stay current, and as a result he changed music,” says Tate.
Tate went on the further explain that he is more than happy with Boseman’s portrayal of Brown so far and even used a mix of the actor’s voice with Brown’s actual voice on many of the film’s musical numbers. “Oh my god, Chad’s having so much fun,” says Tate.
As previously reported, Get on Up features a who’s who list of actors including Dan AcKroyd as Ben Bart, Viola Davis as Susie Brown, Octavia Spencer as Brown’s Aunt Honey, Jill Scott as one of Brown’s wives, Nelsan Ellis as Bobby Byrd, Tika Sumpter as Yvonne Fair, Keith Robinson as Baby Roy and New Edition’s Ralph E. Tresvant, who is rumored to be playing Maceo Parker.
Get On Up is shooting in Mississippi and will open in theaters nationwide on August 1.