Hollywood actors would walk miles through the snow to star in Spielberg’s ‘Lincoln’
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‘Lincoln’ already features one of the more notable castings in a modern Hollywood movie, with Daniel Day-Lewis set to play the iconic president. Now Steven Spielberg’s historical drama has added some more top-tier stars. Tommy Lee Jones and Joseph Gordon-Levitt will costar in the film, as will Tim Blake Nelson (actors with two names, apparently, need not apply). So will Hal Holbrook, James Spader, 2010 Oscar breakout John Hawkes and a host of others, studio DreamWorks said Thursday in a statement.
Jones will play Thaddeus Stevens, a congressman who helped spearhead the abolitionist cause. Gordon-Levitt, a key player in ‘Inception’ and the upcoming ‘The Dark Knight Rises,’ takes on his first significant period role, starring as Robert Todd Lincoln, son of the the 16th president. (You know it’s a good year if Christopher Nolan is the second best-regarded director you’re working with.)
The political tale, which aims to come out in the fall of 2012, is a a look at slavery, abolition and the end of the Civil War through the eyes of Lincoln and his Cabinet. It’s based on a Doris Kearns Goodwin book and a Tony Kushner script, with Sally Field playing the president’s wife, Mary Todd Lincoln.
Some movies get Oscar attention almost by accident. Others seem designed to land it from the start. It is a rarity for a big Hollywood studio to attempt the latter these days. Then again, it helps if your name is Spielberg and you run said studio.
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Sally Field will have a place in the Lincoln White House
-- Steven Zeitchik
Photo: Joseph Gordon-Levitt in ‘Inception.’ Credit: Warner Bros.
