The last time someone tried to mix the tale of a clown with the Holocaust, we got Life Is Beautiful and Jakob The Liar. And while one won plenty of Oscar-shaped kudos and the other proved that Robin Williams truly shouldn’t be allowed near schmaltzy comedy dramas with World War II tragedy mixed in, neither is exactly easy viewing.
But the difficult subject matter continues to attract top talent. And now Jeff Goldblum has signed up to star in Paul Schrader’s take. Adam Resurrected is being adapted from respected Israeli novelist Yoram Kaniuk. It focuses on Adam Stein (Goldblum) a former circus clown threatened with death by the Nazis who is given a last-minute reprieve but then forced to entertain his fellow Jews as they’re marched to the gas chambers.
Fortunately for Stein, he survives the war and ends up finding asylum in Israel’s Negev desert, where he tries to make sense of the world. Shooting is planned to start next year, while Goldblum will next be seen in the sex comedy thriller Mini’s First Time.