Samuel L. Jackson and Michael Caine are ‘Harry and the Butler’
At the American Film Market this season, films left and right are being presented and finding deals, distributors hungry for new product, and films low-budget and higher profile getting a leg up. This is the case for a new film starring Samuel L. Jackson and Michael Caine, which is to be directed by actor and playwright George C. Wolfe (Lackawanna Blues, Nights in Rodanthe and the upcoming You’re Not You with Hilary Swank). The script comes from Damian F. Slattery (A Day in October).
The film has a pretty unique and oddly intriguing premise: Harry (Jackson) is a washed-up roller-coaster mechanic who lives in an empty train carriage in New Orleans. Once a promising violinist, he now spends his days in squalor. But after inheriting a large sum of money, during a celebration he decides to take on an aged butler (Caine), and, as they say, drama and wackiness ensue.
Philippe Rivier, of Spirit Films, and Colin Callender, of Playground Entertainment, are set to produce the film, and it will be presented to prospective buyers and investors by Mimi Steinbauer‘s Radiant Films. It’s a dramedy, and it is a film skewring more to older audiences (albeit every school-boy and girl likely know Jackson and Caine from respective comic-book franchise movies, they might not watch them too much outside of those films until they’re adults). The key at the market is for the production team to find that niche, which seems to be growing, with films that are mature and for an adult audience, without being just Oscar bait or blockbuster stuff (or what were once called ‘One-offs’ in the industry).
“We are very proud to bring together these two great movie icons, Sam Jackson and Michael Caine, under the direction of the great George C. Wolfe. Harry and the Butler follows in the honorable tradition of so many classic films in which a chance encounter between two disparate characters transforms them forever,” said Rivier and Callender.
It wouldn’t be the first time Jackson’s played a derelict out-on-his-luck kind of character – underseen films Resurrecting the Champ and The Caveman’s Valentine speak to his skills at downtrodden guys – and Michael Caine, well, he’s Alfred Pennyworth for heaven’s sake. It looks to be a solid sort of deal – but surprising most of all is that this is, in fact, a remake of a 1962 film called Harry og Kammertjeneren from Denmark.
This is the sort of remake news that is refreshing: something not based on a “property”, but an obscure(er) work that can be seen with fresh eyes. On top of this, Jackson and Caine are not the first actors to be considered; previously, Morgan Freeman and Anthony Hopkins. So the material comes with a pedigree and history that is missing only, simply, a Hollywood studio to back it.
CAA and ICM are representing North American rights. No other cast announced at this time.
