by Jonah Mensch. @jpmensch.
NEW YORK, NY - Director Martin Scorsese, fresh off of his 2019, Oscar-nominated film The Irishman, is reportedly “very interested” in directing an upcoming film adaptation of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat after learning that the film has a narrator, sources confirmed.
“If working on The Irishman taught me anything, it’s that computers are magic and anything is possible,” noted Scorsese while describing his plan to cast Robert De Niro as Joseph, and then transform him into Donny Osmond using VFX technology. “I love working with Bob, but he just doesn’t have that Donny Osmond flair. The only solution I can think of is to use computers to just turn Bob into Donny. Next I’m hoping to book Joe Pesci for the narrator, or maybe Ray Liotta. It’s not traditionally a woman, is it?”
Mr. Scorsese has been praised for his use of voice-over narration in other films such as Taxi Driver and Goodfellas. Still, some were critical of his willingness to take on a project based on this detail alone.
“It’s strictly all about the narrator,” responded the award-winning director’s daughter when asked why her father had any interest at all in directing this adaptation. “He doesn’t even know what the show’s about. I gave him a rundown of the characters and as soon as he heard ‘Narrator,' he signed the contract.”
Rose Schultz, a Netflix producer currently optioning the remake, gave us an exclusive insight to how the screenplay would differ from the 1999 film.
“Marty's planning to set it in 1980’s New York, turning Joseph’s coat into cocaine that the mob is forbidding him to sell,” noted Schultz. “Then, when Joseph’s family leaves him for dead, he devises a plan to murder his family in cold blood.” She then describes subsequently reading Mr. Scorsese the original synopsis.
At press time, we caught up with Robert De Niro in a nearly bankrupt Italian restaurant to discuss the words of his old pal. Sadly, his response to everything we asked was just, “It’s what it is.”