Unless your name is Samuel L. Jackson or Denzel Washington it's tough for an older African-American actor to find a headlining role these days. That's not to say there aren't a number of talented black males out there, but Hollywood has a very small, specific group they'll turn to in order to lead a major production, and when one of those guys drops out, you can pretty much count that film dead. Unfortunately that appears to be what's happened with Kasi Lemmons' adaptation of Black Nativity, which has now been shelved by Fox Searchlight just weeks before shooting was set to begin.
We learned about the film back in July when Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett came aboard, but in the meantime it seems that Jackson has dropped out, and Laurence Fishburne turned down the chance to replace him. Adapted from Langston Hughes' Broadway gospel musical, Black Nativity tells the story of a Baltimore teen who is sent to Harlem to spend Christmas with the grandparents he never knew. Jackson and Bassett were set to play the grandparents, with Jennifer Hudson as their 31-year old daughter. It's unclear why Jackson left, but the scant $10M budget combined with Jackson's high salary probably factored into the equation. Fox Searchlight has denied the film ever had a solid October start date, although there seems to be some dispute on that point.
The problem comes in that there aren't that many well-known black actors who are both old enough to play a grandfather and can handle the heavy singing burden the film requires. Eddie Murphy, Tyler Perry, Jamie Foxx, Don Cheadle, and Will Smith are amongst those the studios trust to carry a feature, but with the exception of Murphy none would make for a good fit in this case. [THR]
