Film + TV

Mr. Robot’s Rami Malek will play Freddie Mercury in Queen biopic

by Tyler Munro

For years, Sacha Baron Cohen was set to play Freddie Mercury in a biopic about the iconic Queen frontman. Once considered his dream role, the project fizzled out due to “creative differences,” quickly turning into a back and forth bicker-fest between a selfie-stick obsessed astrophysicist and the guy whose name-a-Borat.

Now, however, the project rolls on, finally: Variety reports that Rami Malek, of Mr. Robot fame, has been cast as the Queen frontman in the upcoming movie. Called Bohemian Rhapsody, the movie is penned by The Theory of Everything’s Anthony McCarten and, if Cohen is to be believed, will tell a story less centred around Mercury than the aftermath that followed his untimely death in 1991.

Earlier this year, Cohen told Howard Stern that he left the biopic because the other members of Queen wanted the movie to be about how they carried on after Freddie’s death, which he said would take place, at its latest, midway through the film.

Cohen’s comments led Brian May to calling him an “arse,” attributing the split to Cohen’s “poor fit” for the role, and adding that he felt Ben Whishaw, a.k.a. the voice of Paddington Bear, would be a better fit.

We’re big Rami Malek fans and even bigger Queen fans (or is it the other way around?) so here’s hoping this puts Bohemian Rhapsody back on track – the movie has been in development hell since it was first announced back in 2010.