Rolling Stone USA - 08.2019

22 | Rolling Stone | August 2019

FROM TOP, LEFT TO RIGHT: IAN DICKSON/SHUTTERSTOCK; GEORGE KONIG/SHUTTERSTOCK; KENT/MEDIAPUNCH/SHUTTERSTOCK; MICHAEL OCHS ARCHIVES/GETTY IMAGES; GLASS HOUSE FARMS; GAS CANNABIS CO.; MIND YOUR HEAD; SHABOINK

The Mix

R

OCK BIOPICS have been a Hollywood
mainstay since 1978’s The Buddy Holly
Story, but the genre is enjoying an un-
precedented resurgence, thanks to the success
of Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman. “It’s a
bit of a biopic arms race,” says producer Nathan
Ross, who’s working on a John Lennon and Yoko
Ono film. Here’s a look at what’s in the pipeline.

Inside the Rock

Biopic Boom

ARTISTS GET IN THE WEED GAME

TREND

From Jenny Lewis to Post Malone, the best new bud

2 CHAINZ

GAS Cannabis

The rapper

launched a

line called

GAS, which

stands for

“good-ass

shit.” “It’s

Atlanta lingo

• this is a stronger type of
  flower,” he said. “You’ll know it
  when you experience it.”

MICKEY HART

Mind Your Head

The Grateful

Dead drum-

mer is selling

mini-joints

called Mind

Your Head,

an old strain that helped spawn

Sour Diesel and OG Kush. “It’s

the great mother to many elite

strains,” said Hart. “Now it’s

having a gigantic comeback.”

POST MALONE

Shaboink

The hitmaker is going

big with his new com-

pany, launching on his

24th birthday, which

will sell weed, pre-

rolls, rolling papers,

and merch in Califor-

nia. “Weed is good for

everybody,” Malone

has said. “Ain’t nobody

die from that shit.”

Lynyrd Skynyrd

This long-awaited ac-

count of the pioneering

Southern-rock band and

its tragic 1977 plane crash

was held up for years in

court, as director Jared

Cohn battled several band

members’ estates, which

opposed the film’s release

(based on a “blood oath”

taken after the crash).

When the filmmakers

finally won the case on an

appeal last October, Cohn

says he was “weeping

tears of victory.”

ASK ARTIMUS Street

Survivors: The True Story

of the Lynyrd Skynyrd

Plane Crash is largely

based on the new memoir

of longtime drummer

Artimus Pyle. Cohn says

he also spent years poring

over conflicting accounts

in order to tell an accurate

historical story. “I read

every book, every inter-

view,” he says. “It was like

a thesis project.” The film

cost $1.5 million to create.

John & Yoko

This love story — tackling John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s relation-

ship from 1966 to 1980 — is set to be directed by Jean-Marc Vallée

(Dallas Buyers Club), and is being written by Anthony McCarten

(Bohemian Rhapsody). Producer Nathan Ross describes it as an

“intimate portrayal. We wanted to bring the right kind of intimacy

to this storytelling.” Shooting is planned for the first half of 2020.

DOUBLE FANTASY Producers lobbied Ono before she eventually

gave her blessing. “It’s the first time Yoko is allowing her story to

be told,” says Ross. Her support is helping them attain the couple’s

tricky music rights. “There are films that have authorized music and

films that don’t — and you’d rather be the former,” says Ross. “There

was pressure to do right on the part of the artists and their families.”

Elvis Presley

Director Baz Luhrmann is

tackling Presley’s story,

reportedly splitting it into

two sections: one covering

Presley’s wild rise to fame and

the other picking

up in his drug-

addled thirties.

CAST AWAY

While the cast-

ing of the lead

role hasn’t been

announced, sev-

eral big names

— including

Harry Styles,

Ansel Elgort,

and Miles Teller

— have already

auditioned to

play Elvis. Tom

Hanks is set to play Presley’s

controlling manager, Colonel

Tom Parker.

Boy George

Sacha Gervasi, the director

of 2008’s metal doc Anvil, will

tell the story of the Culture

Club frontman. “It’s going

to be extremely irreverent,”

MGM president

Jonathan Glick-

man says of the

approach.

CULTURE

SHOCK Boy

George, who

called the film

“thrilling,” said

he’d love to see

Sophie Turner

play him: “[Peo-

ple say], ‘She

can’t play you,

she’s a woman.’

But when I was

17, I would have loved to have

been her.” Turner replied, “I’m

so down.” JONATHAN BERNSTEIN

Aretha Franklin
This Queen of Soul biopic, titled Respect, had
been in the works long before the singer died,
with Franklin herself picking Jennifer Hudson
to star. “You have no idea how humbled I am,”
Hudson said. Directed by Liesl Tommy (Jessica
Jones), it’s set to debut in August 2020.
TIGHT FOCUS Respect is expected to center
on the singer’s late-Sixties explosion and end
in the early Seventies. “[We asked ourselves],
‘How does her story reflect those times?’ ”
says Jonathan Glickman, president of MGM.

Lynyrd

Skynyrd’s

Allen Collins

and Ronnie

Van Zant, 1977

Ono and

Lennon, 1970

The King and

the Colonel, 1957

“I’m a pothead,” Jenny Lewis says. Example:

Once, when her bus was about to cross into

Canada, she buried the pot in a park and

drew a map so she could find it. Now, Lewis

has released her own brand of weed, the

Rabbit Hole, a low-THC Sour Diesel she says

is “very light but also very creative.” She’s not

the only artist entering the pot business.

Franklin, 1967