I wish they would do a remake of The Grapes of Wrath.

[pamela]

HeHe. I know I'll probably get flamed for saying that. I know it's a great movie and a classic and all that but I would still like to see a remake. I just read the book again last weekend and now I'm watching the movie on AMC. I was really excited to see that it was on because I've only seen it once and I was thinking about renting it again.

Anyway, I'm rambling, but the reason that I'd like to see a remake is that the old classic has that fake scenery background and the characters are played too broad-almost cartoonish, at times. The movie also doesn't show the depth and complexity of Ma Joad and the other women.

So, it's 4 am here on the east coast and I'm trying to decide who I'd like to see in the remake of The Grapes of Wrath. Any suggestions?

I'm thinking...

Tom Joad-Viggo Mortenson, Johnny Depp or Tim Robbins
Ma Joad- can't decide
Preacher- can't decide- maybe Peter Fonda as sort of an homage
Pa Joad- Martin Sheen
Rose of Sharon- Natalie Portman or Scarlet Johanson

Ok, give me shit. Remake the Grapes of Wrath! Oh no!

[bluestateguy]

1. I've had enough of remakes for awhile

Next year apparently we'll have to endure do-overs of Revenge of the Nerds and Police Academy.

[pamela]

2. Wow.

Were they even worth doing the first time?

[Melodybe]

6. Agreed they should definitely remake it

just to bring attention to the plight of the Joad families and the parallels of today.

Hmmm, casting is a hobby of mine, I think Sheen is a good choice for pa but I would go with Robert Duvall.

Maybe if you olded up Jessica Lange she could play Ma.

I like Viggo as Tom, I think that is a great choice, ditto for Peter Fonda too.

[pamela]

9. Oh yeah, Robert Duvall is a great choice.

I thought about Jessica Lange for Ma or maybe Kathy Bates or Judy Dench(sp?).

[WCGreen]

10. Kathy Bates for Ma

Cause she has the grounded quality about her....

David Caradine for Pa.....

Thora Burch for Roseasharon....

Now bear with me on this.....

Jim Carrey as the preacher... You have to have a phycotic feel to play that one right

And for Tom, Tom Hanks... He could play him like he did the lt in Saving Private Ryan.....

[Tom Kitten]

3. Use non-professional actors

film it Salt of the Earth style...use the great people you mentioned for small roles if you can get them!

[pamela]

4. That's a good idea.

I was having a hard time picturing any of the ones I mentioned in the roles, to be honest. Unknowns would be good.

[Nostradammit]

5. Nor does the original show Steinbeck's ending -

Which was one of the greatest of book endings.

Don't tell Ashcroft, but it involves women's breasts.

[JI7]

7. anyone know what Steinbeck's opinion was of the movie

especially their leaving out the ending ?

[pamela]

12. Good question.

I found this http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/johnstei.htm

"For The Grapes of Wrath Steinbeck traveled around California migrant camps in 1936. When the book appeared, it was attacked by US Congressman Lyle Boren who characterized it as "a lie, a black, infernal creation of twisted, distorted mind". Later, when Steinbeck received his Nobel Prize, the Swedish Academy called it simply "an epic chronicle." The Exodus story of Okies on their way to an uncertain future in California, ends with a scene in which Rose of Sharon, who has just delivered a stillborn child, suckles a starving man with her breast. "Rose of Sharon loosened one side of the blanket and bared her breast. 'You got to,' she said. She squirmed closer and pulled his head close. 'There!' she said. 'There.' Her hand moved behind his head and supported it. Her fingers moved gently in his hair. She looked up and across the barn, and her lips came together and smiled mysteriously."

John Ford's film version from 1940, produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, dismissed this ending - the final images optimistically celebrate President Roosevelt's New Deal. "We're the people that live. They can't wipe us out. They can't lick us. We'll go on forever, Pa, 'cause we're the people," says Ma Joad. Steinbeck himself was skeptical of Hollywood's faithfulness to his material. However, after seeing the film he said: "Zanuck has more than kept his word. He has a hard, straight picture in which the actors are submerged so completely that it looks and feels like a documentary film and certainly has a hard, truthful ring." Orson Welles did not like Ford's interpretation because he "made that into a story about mother love."

[pamela]

8. Exactly!

That ending is so powerful and so grim.

[Nostradammit]

11. And beautiful -

I think I remember from the commentary track on the DVD that he wasn't very fond of the movie and was just reading up on it here:

http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/fns02n4.html


I know if I were Steinbeck, they'd have had to pick me up out of the screening room chair, I'd be so crushed by what Ford did at the end.

Of course, given the mores of the time, and considering that none of the conservative movie moguls even wanted to make the film Ford did what he thought he could get away with.

I'd never seen the movie until recently and was just flabbergasted when the credits started rolling.


THAT'S IT?!!


Don't know who I'd get to play in the remake, but I'd pay to see it.

[pamela]

15. Yes, beautiful ending.

That book was haunting me all week.

I like that link. Thanks for posting it.

It's funny, I really thought I'd get bashed for even suggesting a remake, but maybe I'm on to something.

[Wetzelbill]

13. I'll volunteer to direct it :) nt

[pamela]

17. I was thinking Spielberg but, ok, you can direct it. :-) n/t

[Wetzelbill]

18. yeah, Spielberg or me, pretty much the same thing

And that concludes this episode of Delusional Theater.

[Dogmudgeon]

14. Ma Joad -- Kathy Bates

Superlative actor. She could play anything.

The other actors are excellent choices, but here are my narrowed-down choices:

Tom Joad - Tim Robbins. He's really the only choice for Tom.

Preacher - Peter Fonda. Kevin Nealon, late of SNL, is a better dramatic actor than comedian, so he'd be good. He played a scientist in Déjà Vu, a new Outer Limits episode (5.16), as well as a number of dramatic bit parts. I don't know why he does so much comedy when he's put in sucky roles -- even dark comedy would be a better choice for him.

Pa Joad - John Cullum. Martin Sheen would be good, but he's really not deadpan enough to play a man beaten by life. Cullum is a superlative actor, but he's mainly known from Broadway (Shenendoah, Urinetown), not Hollywood. He played the farmer in The Day After, which was a kind of Pa Joad character already, and B-movie vixen Lori Lethin played a Rose-of-Sharon-like character, his daughter Denise, in the same movie.

Rose of Sharon - Alas, Lori Lethin is too old now to credibly play a pregnant teenage girl, but Scarlett Johanson would be excellent. Natalie Portman may be able to act like a dumb bimbo, but not credibly, IMO. Nikki Clyne from the new Battlestar Galactica (she plays Callie) would be a good choice, given longer hair and a bleach job. (She was also in Saved as the guitar-playing girl).

Anyway, that's how I would desecrate TGOW.

--p!

[pamela]

16. John Collum. Hollis from Northern Exposure?

I can see that, definitely. I think I just want Martin Sheen in a role because it just seems right that he should do that movie. Maybe he could produce it.

[Dogmudgeon]

19. John Collum as Hollis in Northern Exposure

I think so. I never watched the show very much -- I had an evening-night job in the 1990s.

He has been part of the B'way scene forever. I think he started as the narrator of The Fantasticks which also gave Jerry Orbach his start.

He's a fantastic actor, though. I've also seen him on other TV shows, doing character spots, notably Law and Order, to which my mother is addicted.

--p!

[pamela]

20. I like him, too.

I just finished watching the movie and I was picturing him in the part. He has that quiet, worn-down-by-life look that Pa Joad needs. I decided Martin Sheen could play the guy in charge of the one camp where they have sanitary facilities and treat the families with respect. Not a big part but important.