Oh, this is just too rich. On the scale of Hollywood liberals that Republicans hate the crap out of the most, Jane Fonda has been sitting near the top longer than almost anybody. She's been on their shit list so long, I'm betting most don't even know why she's so despised. They just hate her because it was hammered into their head at a young age. Basically, she was one of the staunchest protesters of the Vietnam War, and saw her career derailed because of the decisions she made.
So this is going to drive the stick up the right wing's butts even further, as Fonda has been chosen to play the "Conservative" queen herself, Nancy Reagan, in Lee Daniels' civil rights film, The Butler. Oh, I can hear Sean Hannity's little tic-tac brain rattling around that massive Frankenstein head already. The story is a great one, telling the true tale of Eugene Allen, a black man who worked as a servant in the White House for more than 30 years and under eight Presidents, watching the civil rights movement from a unique point of view. Forest Whitaker will play Allen, with David Oyelowo(Red Tails) as his young son. Fonda's role is said to be a small one, little more than an expanded cameo.
Daniels has run into road blocks getting other similarly themed movies off the ground, such as his Martin Luther King biopic, Selma. If the cast for this one fully rounds into shape, with Oprah Winfrey, Liam Neeson, Mila Kunis, Hugh Jackman, and John Cusack circling roles as great historical figures, then there's not a studio in the country that won't finance it. Game Change scribe, Danny Strong, wrote the first draft of the script.
Now if only they could get Sean Penn to play Ronald Reagan. [Variety]
