The Casting Couch: Dr. Watson

One of my most popular posts ever was that about the still-uncast role of Mr. Rochester in the upcoming Jane Eyre adaptation with Ellen Page in the title role. And like Hollywood, I know what to do with a good thing: sequelize it until all the originality of the original is but a vague memory.

When I first heard that there was going to be a “re-interpretation”  of Sherlock Holmes, putting more emphasis on his action-hero side and less on his powers of observation, I didn’t see how it could be anything but a disaster. The choice of Guy Ritchie as a director didn’t do much to alleviate my fears: while I do think his take on current London is interesting and stylish enough to make me wonder what he’ll do with a much older incarnation of the city, I don’t want to see Sherlock Holmes done Lock, Stock style. But then Robert Downey Jr. was cast in the title role, and I began wondering if it might actually work, at least a little.

The problem is: rumors are Russell Crowe might play Dr. Watson. And that, my friends, is a bad idea. Not that Crowe is a bad actor: I might not like him much, but it’s undeniable that he has star charisma and a rather wide range. But that star charisma is exactly the problem. Watson isn’t just any second banana, he’s THE second banana: he’s colorless, unremarkable. Oh, he’s smart, he can write, and he often provides the key to the case, but he’s someone you don’t see when he’s standing next to Sherlock. And Crowe is just impossible to miss.

Luckily, Ritchie seems to agree. In an interview with Empire Online, he said:

I don’t have a Watson. Somebody just told me that I have Russell Crowe lined up but that’s news to me. I suspect that hasn’t happened and I’m still looking for my Watson.

Well, I have some suggestions for him after the jump.

The Casting Couch: Mr. Rochester

In an attempt to revive the blog: new feature! I don’t like posting all the inane casting news here, but sometimes it does spark my imagination. So in this feature, I’ll try to cast roles that haven’t been announced yet. These aren’t people I think will get the role, but people who I think would be an interesting choice. And I’ll try not to pick too similar options.

To start with, it was announced last week that Ellen Page is going to play Jane Eyre in the nth film version of that great example of gothic literature. A Mr. Rochester, however, hasn’t been found that. While I don’t really see the need for yet another version (I think the Joan Fontaine/Orson Welles one is pretty good, to no-one’s surprise, and I rather liked the miniseries the BBC made two years ago), Mr. Rochester is a great character, and as Ellen Page will probably give a more modern interpretation of mousy Jane, who will be the dark broody master she falls for.

Mt top suggestion is without a question Richard Armitage. He plays Guy of Gisborne, henchmen to the Sheriff of Nottingham in the new BBC Robin Hood series, and he’s great: glowering, broody, conflicted, hopelessly in love with Maid Marian and making every female viewer eager to redeem him, despite his evil deeds. If that weren’t enough, I recently saw the miniseries North and South, where he plays a Darcy-esque character to the hilt: he’s haughty, superior, but it doesn’t take that much to breach his armor and making him wholly dependent on the woman who managed to do it.

But I also have some less predictable choices…see for yourself, after the jump.