Johnny Flynn believes 'Stardust' will show audiences an unknown David Bowie - The Number One magazine feat. news, reviews, movie trailers, cinema, DVDs, interviews + film & movie gossip UK & worldwide.
Johnny Flynn on the challenges of playing David Bowie
11 minutes to read
By: Will Hodgkinson
Johnny Flynn turned down the role of David Bowie in a new film. The British actor tells Will Hodgkinson why he then changed his mind. Who would play David Bowie in a movie? Any film about a beloved rock star runs the risk of creating an image that clashes with the one in the minds of fans, but with Bowie that danger reaches another level. He was everything from the alien rock god Ziggy Stardust to the Thin White Duke of the mid-Seventies to the Goblin King of the 1986 kids classic, Labyrinth. Idolisation of Bowie has gone into the realm of deification. When he left us in January 2016 it came as a seismic shock, not least because he seemed too clever to fall victim to something as mundane as death.
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It’s five years since David Bowie passed away, leaving behind fifty-year legacy of creativity and inspiration. A movie biopic has been the dream of many a filmmaker since before Bowie died, with Danny Boyle recently attempting to make a musical. Bowie refused to allow the director to use the rights to his songs, scuppering the project. Bowie’s estate has likewise refused permission for this week’s release, Stardust, but unlike Boyle, director Gabriel Range has persevered.
Stardust confines itself to the months following the release of Bowie’s third album,
The Man Who Sold The World, in 1970, and his US promotional tour the following year. Forgoing the grander picture and his later hits (the film did not receive permission from the Bowie Estate to use any Bowie music),
Stardust offers a keyhole perspective on the period responsible for launching the cultural icon.
Stardust, 2021(Film still)
The three-week US tour might have been the catalyst for all that followed, but things don’t get off to a good start in
Stardust. No sooner has he touched down stateside, Bowie is told he lacks the necessary visa to perform. His superstar aspirations are further dashed when Ron Oberman (Marc Maron), the Mercury Records publicist organising the tour, greets Bowie at the airport and shows him to his ride . in the back of his waiting parent’s car. What unfolds feels at times like a road movie, with Oberman chauffeuring Bowie between disastrous morning radi
J
ohnny Flynn in a dress is the stuff that dreams are made of. Alas, he’s all dolled up with nowhere to go in this David Bowie biopic.
The focus is on a difficult year in Bowie’s life. In 1971, Davy Jones (Flynn) embarks on a doomed tour of the States, to promote The Man Who Sold the World. For various legal reasons, he’s not allowed to perform any of his songs. For so many other reasons too, he’s struggling to find his voice. Ron Oberman (Marc Maron), the middle-aged press officer schlepping Bowie around the country, senses that something’s wrong and encourages the young man to face his demons.