For the majority of his career, Michael Fassbender has been known for serious drama, big action movies or films without much to really laugh about, unless you count some of the X-Men: First Class comedy moments or used giggling as a self defence mechanism while watching Jonah Hex. But now he’s signed up for a proper comedy in the shape of Frank.
Lenny Abrahamson is set to direct the film, which boasts a script by Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan - who, possibly not coincidentally, adapted Ronson’s book The Men Who Stare At Goats for the big screen.
Frank follows the misadventures of an aspiring musician (Domhnall Gleeson), who gets in over his head when he joins an eccentric rock band led by the OTT Frank (Fassbender).
It certainly sounds like it could be a blast, especially if Fassbender gets to go all Velvet Goldmine (though without pulling a Ewan McGregor).
Fassbender, of course, most recently finished shooting Twelve Years A Slave with old pal / collaborator Steve McQueen and has been working on Ridley Scott’s The Counselor. He’s next scheduled to return to the First Class universe for the sequel. Gleeson, meanwhile, will be on screen in Dredd and will also show up in Anna Karenina. Both films show up on the same day – this Friday, September 7. It's clearly a good week to be ginger.