In a once in a lifetime confluence of Brokeback Mountain and drunken Suzy Kolber-related humor, reports have surfaced that Jake Gyllenhaal is going to play Joe Namath in a biopic about the famed womanizing, fur coat wearing, Super Bowl guaranteeing Jets quarterback. This has been rumored for a while, see FanHouser Dan Benton's take from this summer, but it appears that once the screenwriter strike is history a script will be penned and produced by Universal Pictures.
After seeing Jarhead, I don't doubt that Gyllenhaal has the physicality for the role but neither that film nor the more rest of his catalog have me convinced that he's got the charisma, nor the carpet of chest hair, necessary to knock the part out of the park. Namath is such a magnetic and well-known figure that you need someone who is going to own the screen and inhabit the character to its fullest limit, a la Jamie Foxx in Ray. Otherwise you could end up with John Goodman in The Babe. Good actor, disastrous movie.
Since they are going with Gyllenhaal, I'd imagine the movie would end before covering the moment that sent Namath to Alcoholics Anonymous and birthed one of the finest blogs we've ever known. Just so long as it doesn't gloss over his pantyhose commercial. That's Oscar material.
(H/T to CHUD.com)
