The A Team is Back!

You probably have a couple of choices if you're looking for inspiration as a screenwriter - you can reach for high quality literature and craft great films - such as LOTR - or you can rip off TV shows and do a bad job as with Starsky and Hutch (actually I liked that movie - its just that it was self-consciously a p-take, whereas the original didn't realise it was funny...).

Which brings us to the A Team - could it be that such great lines as "I pity the fool" will be reincarnated for the big screen? Apparently yes. Release date is set for June 2010 and with Ridley Scott apparently involved you'd at least hope it might be OK.

What really interests me is who they might get to play the main parts. So I went to the casting couch of the mind to make my choices for the main roles:

Hannibal - the hardest to cast by a mile - George Peppard was so distinctive in this role. Another George...Clooney would be interesting (or predicatable), but may just be the wrong kind of urbane. You could go to the "older" generation - Bruce Willis, Tommy Lee Jones, Burt Reynolds...but I think I'd replace one made for TV face with another and go for the laconic Richard Dean Anderson aka MacGyver - kinda the same show...

BA - this is hard - Samuel L Jackson might have the verbal chops but he doesn't have the physique. Ving Rhames has the physical presence but may actually be too big - remember BA was shortish. But he appeals as the best of the more well known actors - maybe they should cast an unknown dopplegangar of the man as the dialogue is not that challenging and acting was never a necessary part of this role - there must be an over-hyped rapper who could do with the celebrity and perhaps it would help bring a new audience in - for an outside chance, how about Mike Tyson? Nah the dialogue would be beyond him and his little girl voice...

Face - there are a bunch of smooth-faced options for this role - Tom Cruise will probably try to get it but really?! Val Kilmer before the weight went on...I suppose they could go for a Damon-Affleck-Pitt kind of "character". What about Ashton Kutcher? He already has the droopy 70's look down...or you could go for Owen Wilson - you'd just need to find a role for Ben Stiller somewhere in there...

Murdoch - surely this is Jim Carrey's perfect role? Possibly the one character who could be enhanced by a fresh face.

How good would it be to have a job transforming these shows into movies? Now that would be working for a living...