There was a time when Lenny Kravitz’s only connection to movies was when his songs appearing on the soundtrack. But, thanks to a small role in Precious, playing Cinna in The Hunger Games (a part he’ll reprise in Catching Fire), and Lee Daniels' upcoming The Butler, he’s now making strides on screen. And according to the Evening Standard, he’s now director Julien Temple’s choice to play Marvin Gaye in a new film.

The movie, which has been in development for a while now (and has faced down competition from Cameron Crowe’s planned biopic) is set near the end of the singer’s life.

With his glory days seemingly behind him, Gaye had fled to London under investigation for tax evasion and deep into drug and alcohol addiction. Music promoter Freddy Couseart took him to his flat in Belgium and helped him pull out of the tailspin. The result was his first post-Motown album, Midnight Love, which featured the now iconic single Sexual Healing.

Temple has been getting the financing together to make the movie, and assuming Kravitz is locked in, it could help him finally start shooting.