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UPFRONTS 2013: TV Spinoffs’ Almost Perfect Year 
EXCLUSIVE: Robert Forster has been signed to play Ronald Reagan in The Lifeguard: Ronald Reagan and His Story, a one-man stage play written by David Rambo to be directed by Tony Award winner Peter Hunt. The play is being produced by David Permut and Mark Travis, with Merry-Kay and Steven Poe. Permut and Travis plan to follow the template they established with James Whitmore and Give ‘Em Hell Harry. That Harry Truman story was first mounted as a stage show that toured the country, and it was filmed and released as a theatrical feature in 1975. Hunt directed Whitmore in that role. Rehearsals start March 1 for the Reagan play. The producers are booking the tour now, with the hope they will end up on Broadway, where the performance will be filmed. Even though studios turned down Give ‘Em Hell Harry, the producers were able to book the film directly with exhibitors, which began showing the film three weeks after it was shot. Whitmore was nominated for an Oscar for his performance as Truman, and the $100,000 budget film grossed over $10 million. The producers did even better when they followed the same strategy with Richard Pryor Live in Concert, which grossed over $30 million.
Rambo is the CSI writer whose plays include God’s Man in Texas, The Ice Breaker and The Lady with All the Answers. The Lifeguard covers Reagan’s rise from humble beginnings to Screen Actors Guild president, California governor and iconic U.S. president. The Reagan family has been involved in a consulting capacity through the development of the project.
Forster got a career second wind when Quentin Tarantino cast him to star in Jackie Brown. Forster has since worked extensively in TV and films, and was recently set for JJ Abrams’ series Alcatraz after playing a recurring role on Heroes. Permut, Travis and Hunt considered many actors to play Reagan, before deciding Forster was right for the role. The deals comes on the eve of what would have been Reagan’s 100th birthday this Sunday, an event that will be commemorated at halftime of the Super Bowl.
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Wow.
This is so dating myself, but I worked with Peter Hunt when he was a lighting director at Williamstown Summer Theater. Of course, I have kept track of his directing career.
In any case, Robert Forster is a terrific actor. I hope Robert and Peter can put together a great one man Ronald Reagan play. Ronald Reagan certainly was an interesting character regardless of your political convictions.
Good luck, and I hopes it makes it to LA.
This one really dates me, as well. Peter Hunt used to babysit me when I was a child, that is when he wasn’t sneaking out of the house to buy another record at Canterbury’s on Colorado. This meant a round trip of almost 5 miles on his bicycle. He was always going places then, too, and very into the arts. Take a life long passion for something and combine it with a lot of drive and careful planning and people willing to open doors right and left for you to help you succeed, and you can wind up with a pretty impressive success story. Here’s hoping this project gets off the ground well, too.
Ahh yes, Morning in America. Double digit inflation, mass unemployment, Abscam, Iran Contra, trickle down, Star Wars missile defense boondoggle, stock market crash of ’87, exploding space shuttles, free cheese handouts. What a joy it all was. If you want to see a movie about Reagan’s failed presidency, rent REPO MAN.
Ten kids in a Cadillac
Stand in line for welfare checks
Let’s all leach off the state
Gee, the money’s…really great
We just get by
However we can
We all gotta duck
When the shit hits the fan.
-Circle Jerks
Don’t think the politics should affect if it’s a good and entertaining show. Harry Truman was no conservative yet people on both sides of the aisle would enjoy that show. I bet this one will be the same!
“Neener-neener” polemics. Don’t talk the talk (and think you’re being clever). If you don’t like whichever party’s elected politicians, get out from behind that telemarketing cubicle or Mom’s back bedroom and and be an activist. Volunteer. Canvas. Walk the walk. Otherwise you really are one of the circle jerks.
or maybe touchscreen voting is rigged?
wakey
wakey
anyway, Forster rules
It’s rather uncouth to be waving your ignorance of the man and his accomplishments around in public like that. Makes you look dumb.
Finally, a tribute to the greatest president we ever had. After decades of Hollywood Libs cramming JFK hagiography crap down our throats how they will gag at this rare tribute to such a great man.
Are you aware that the reason the Soviets agreed to disarm was because they feared SDI. Only liberal idiots called it Star Wars. The Soviets were terrified of the Strategic Defense Initiative because they knew it was something they had no counter-measure to. Reagan offered to share the technology with them and they turned him down. It’s time to admit that Reagan won the cold war. The Berlin Wall fell in 1989 because Reagan told Gorbachev in 1987 to “tear down this wall!”
“Reagan won the cold war”
Americans like to think that. It is much more complicated than that.
No, it really is not. That failed regime would still be around with your kind of thinking.
Anyway, it sounds like an interesting project about a great man.
Oh I forgot:
“The Berlin Wall fell in 1989 because Reagan told Gorbachev in 1987 to “tear down this wall!”
That was a joke right? You think Gorbachov did that because Reagan told so?? Have you ever really looked into that subject or read any book about it or you just say your propaganda?
Saying Reagan “won the Cold War” is about ignorant as it gets when it comes to 20th century history. Unfortunately many Americans still believe that bullshit.
No wonder you call yourself John Doe.
ROTFLMAO! Double-digit inflation was what Jimmy Carter gave us, and Reagan was the one who brought it back down.
Abscam? Gee, that was a scandal that involved DEMOCRAT members of Congress going to jail *before* Reagan was president, while a recent liberal hero, Fat Jack Murtha ended up an unindicted co-conspirator in that one (only he got off the hook leaving him free decades later to slander US troops fighting in Iraq before he keeled over).
Star Wars-Gee the thing that even SOVIET sources now admit they were scared of and got them to change their tune dramatically.
Taken collectively, that post so perfectly illustrates what Reagan said in his great “A Time For Choosing” speech. “The problem with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant, it’s just that they know a lot that isn’t so.”
Yep. But enough about the Democratic Congress.
I guess you’re unaware of Congress stopping Reagan at EVERY turn when he wanted to curb spending??
Double Digit inflation, mass unemployment and endless welfare were Democrat Congress and Carter gifts to Reagan, who turned it around with the largest economic and jobs expansion in history at that point prior to the boom between 2K3 – 2K6.
Abscam nailed one of your guys – John Terd Murtha – who should have gone to jail but found his way into the leadership role in Nancy Pelosi’s most crooked House in History.
Crash of 87 was the result of 40 years of failed economic spending by unchecked liberal rule of the House and Senate. All spending comes from those bodies, not the other way around.
Government Cheese is part of the Dem legacy – along with Dem governors blocking black students to schools in the south, Dem Mayors and Sherrifs manning water cannons and Racist Dem Senators lead by Robert KKK Byrd in fillibustering against Civil Rights. Nice legacy! I think Reagan’s legacy stands far in the column of excellence when you compare it to the awful legacy of racist fascist marxist demz!
Hunt is a great director, and really knows how to do a one man show. Forster is a legendary actor – this should really be an amazing show!
Of course, the best filmic example of Reagan’s presidency can be seen in ROGER & ME — the “pets or meat” metaphor succinctly summarizing the underlying viciousness of the guy’s whole political philosophy.
Hey Circle Jerks,
Double digit inflation, gas lines around the block, pessimism, Iran falling to extremists, Iran hostage crisis for over a year – you mean Jimmy Carter, don’t you?
Now now… don’t go and confuse the progressives with facts.
Make sure he doesn’t say the word AIDS for the bulk of the play while people in row after row are dying during his endless monologue.
The Reagan Administration spent a ton of the taxpayers money on AIDS research. That’s the inconvenient truth left out by the wackos who want to blame him for something he has no responsibility for (of course personal responsibility is something those extremists wouldn’t know the first thing about).
Clearly, all the people educated by the socialists after Reagan was out of office are crawling out of their holes to comment on this. Give a rest, look up some facts and don’t believe everything they told you in re-education camp.
I wonder how they will depict the cabinet meetings where Reagan fell asleep or how they will handle his rehearsing possible answers for press conferences?
Rehearsed or not, at least Reagan didn’t use a teleprompter for his press conferences like President Hopey-Changey.
Considering that Reagan’s own diaries and handwritten materials have rendered your silly old stereotype of Reagan as uninvolved a shambles (it usually helps to not be behind the times when it comes to the state of Reagan scholarship) such a scene will not be necessary at all. OTOH, I’d sure love to see SNL dare to give us a sketch of the current occupant without his teleprompter.
I think the Reagan era was when America decided it was OK to only look out for yourself, to despise the poor, deny any problems you don’t want to see (it took the Gipper six years to mention the word AIDS) and preach love for God while despising the poor, needy and vulnerable. Is that what Jesus would do? No doubt the show will play well in Palinville, but for so many of us Reagan was the sweet simpleton who started America on its extraordinary decline. Break A Leg!
There is no classier person in all of Hollywood than the great Bob Forster. Worked with him and LOVE this guy!
So far, this whole Reagan show/movie sounds like nothing more than a whitewash. It ought to instead tell the truth about how his administration was a long-running tragedy for this country – ballooning debt, violating the Constitution, enabling Wall Street corporate greed. Teabaggers around the U.S. exist because of the nonsense this buffoon peddled 3 decades ago.
When it comes to Administrations that actually violated the Consitution, we should start with the Slickmeister (obstruction of justice and perjury) and let’s also take note of the current occupant’s open defiance of Federal court rulings regarding his un-Constituational health care measure and his un-Constitutional oil drilling ban before we ask what Reagan supposedly violated.
I realize of course that liberal Reagan haters are still bitter that everything Reagan said about (1) the evilness of the Soviet Union and (2) the menace of Big Government have been proved right, which is why they like to keep ranting on and on decades after the fact. But the amusing thing is how silent they become when trying to make a case for Jimmy Carter or Fritz Mondale.
I don’t personally hate the man. I hate most of the things he did and the destructive policies he pursued. As for the “menace” of Big Government – government is only a menace if you choose to make it one. It can either work FOR you or AGAINST you. In any case, if government is running dysfunctionally, it’s only because teabaggers like yourselves get into government and try to wreck all the good things it does for people. And why are you talking about Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale? This isn’t about them – it’s about Reagan and his MANY failures. Whatever Jimmy Carter was, he wasn’t someone who ballooned the federal debt over 400% like your beloved Reagan did. Carter didn’t let Wall Street loose to manipulate and destroy the economy like your beloved Reagan did (Can you say “stock market crash” and “Savings and Loan crisis?”). But then, when it comes to increasing debt and making life worse for Americans, Republicans/conservatives/teabaggers like yourself do excel at that, don’t you?
And you know, why are you calling Obama “the Slickmeister?” Why don’t you call him what all you teabaggers call him when no one’s watching (and a couple of times when people are watching): the n-word! Come on…I know you’re ITCHING to say it! Go ahead! Say it! You’ll feel better, and then the whole world can see what you teabaggers really, truly are.
Oh, and guess what? Health care reform? NOT unconstitutional. I know grasping that is beyond the capabilities of your peanut-sized teabagger brain, but it’s true. And banning oil-drilling? ALSO not unconstitutional. Perfectly within the scope of the constitution. You know, you keep saying the word unconstitutional – I do not think it means what you think it means.
According to the judge in Florida, you are incorrect. There is nothing in the commerce clause that says the government has the right to force people to buy something simply because they are alive. In order for the govt. to make people pay for car insurance, they have to have made the decision to purchase a car. This kind of thing is EXACTLY what the constitution denies the US government. As for peanut-sized brains, that is obviously an order of magnitude larger than yours. Please go back to your giant bong and use that firebrand to light up.
Yes, just what we need, yet ANOTHER movie based on Ronald Reagan, which paints his entire Presidency as completely rosy, just to blow sunshine up everyone’s ass, while the blue-collar and poor begin their decline into oblivion through the 1980′s, and the income gap gets larger, and larger, and larger…
Not to mention all of the administration officials who were either forced to resign, were arrested, indicted for breaking the law, or investigated for criminal behavior. Numbering somewhere in the 100′s. And that was before there was internet to scrutinize the hell out of everything.
Income and revenues went *up* in the 1980s. Mind telling me what was happening to the same under Jimmy Carter?
As for administration officials etc. let’s have some names please. Ray Donovan, who was acquitted of all charges and then asked tellingly, “Where do I get my reputation back?” Ed Meese, who was hounded relentlessly yet never found to have done anything wrong? Richard Allen, acquitted? And if we then want to talk about the witchhunt farce that was Iran-Contra in which foreign policy differences suddenly became criminalized (and in which Democrat members of Congress who loved to kiss Communist thug Danny Ortega’s ass tried to paint themselves as noble) go right ahead, because that says more about the lynchmob mentality of the media elite which today yawns and excuses the real cases of corruption and wrongdoing in the administrations of Clinton and Obama.
ejp,
Incomes and revenues went up in the 1980s? Ok, but for WHOM? Not the middle class, whose wages have remained stagnant and level for decades. No, incomes and revenues went up for the RICH and the POWERFUL – the wealthy and corporate America. That’s who Reagan fought for – the upper 1%. The rest of us, he could care less, and he proved it with his disaster of a presidency.
You know, why don’t you just crawl back into the teabagger hole you came out of. Seriously, go back to reading propagandists like Matt Drudge or the idiot legions at Redstate or any number of conservative blogs. Your insularity and general know-nothingness will fit in there.
Ahh yes, things were soooooo great when Reagan came in.. Stagflation, double digit interest rates, gas lines, pollution so bad your skin would get infected if you went in the ct or Hudson river, Iran takes our embassy and the soviets laughed their ass off at us…. So great
I hear that Quinn Redeker, actor and academy award nominated screenwriter for The Deer Hunter, is preparing a series of videocasts and a one man show on Ronald Reagan. I saw the first videocast and he looks and sounds just like Reagan. Pretty amazing stuff. Hollbrook looked like Twain. Whitmore looked like Truman. Love Robert Forrester but he looks and sounds nothing like Ronald Reagan
Awesome! Forster can do no wrong in my book. Hope to see it!
I look forward to seeing a play about Ronald Reagan. I grew up during his presidency and it was an honor when I got to shake his hand at West Point. He truly is a monumental figure in the history of our country and based on their past work of “Give em Hell Harry” I know that this will be an outstanding play. I can not wait for its opening.
Wow. Alex Cox. The Circle Jerks. You’re old.
I loved Ronald Reagan! This play is coming out at the right time for our country. We need an inspirational play like this and no one will be better than Robert Forster.
Hopefully, it will be in San Francisco soon!
I loved Ronald Reagan! This play is coming out at the right time for our country. We need an inspirational play like this and no one will be better than Robert Forster.
Yes, I interviewed Reagan. Later I also interviewed his astrologer. Not impressed.
But Forster will do a great job.
Long overdue.
Under Jimmy Carter, Americans went through two of the worst years of inflation in 60 years. The inflation rate was inflation rate rose while family income dropped and we had the highest tax bill in our history. We lost our edge in technology and in global markets due to excessive government regulation and oppressive taxes which devoured capital investment. Carter left office with hostages in Iran, an inflation rate of 12%, rising unemployment and Prime interest rate of 21%
When Reagan was inaugurated, the hostages in Iran were released.
President Reagan’s economic policies stimulated the economy, creating 17 million new jobs. One-fourth of the new jobs were created in 68 consecutive months. Black unemployment was cut in half. The inflation rate decreased to less than 4.4% while family income rose 12% and the unemployment rate fell to 5.3% by the end of his second term.
We were given incentives to save our money, to work, and to invest because of Reagan’s tax reforms.
The U.S. military was refurbished and strengthened and we experienced the longest and strongest peacetime prosperity in our nation’s history. His foreign policy of peace through strength has been credited with helping to bring down the Soviet Union.
After 16 years of war, scandals, incompetency, and disastrous Presidencies of LBJ, Nixon, Ford, and Carter, President Reagan restored America’s faith in government, relieved fears, and made America strong and proud again. He also reclaimed America’s place as world leader.
Probably his greatest asset was his ability to bypass the media, go over Congresses head, and directly speak and connect with the American people. Thus the title “The great communicator”
The release of the hostages was not due to Ronald Reagan. Under Carter, Warren Christopher led the negotiations and was the driving force behind getting them released. The Iranians held on to them intentionally until the moment of Reagan’s inauguration as a slap in the face to Carter. The Iranians intensely disliked Carter and it was purely a revenge tactic to not release them while Carter was still president. Warren Christopher published an extensive documentation of this process from notes made in the days immediately after the hostage crisis was resolved titled DIPLOMACY:THE NEGLECTED IMPERATIVE.
President Reagan represented bi-partisanship which we are so lacking in today’s politics. I look forward to seeing the play and hope that people from either the left or the right will be able to appreciate what Ronald Reagan represented.
-Mike
“President Reagan represented bi-partisanship which we are so lacking in today’s politics”.
LMAO, please tell me you’re kidding?
Jesus Christ almighty, I can’t believe how many Americans have short-term memory, and selective memory of the entire 1980′s.
Didn’t President Obama read a Reagan biography during his vacation in Hawaii? (What does that tell us?) We can’t deny that his name is invoked by almost every politician across the isle. Can’t wait to see it – hope you guys visit Houston.
Time magazine just last week had Obama and Reagan together in a photoshop cover. “What Obama can learn from Reagan” was the headline. Liberals are now trying to co-opt the Reagan legacy as their own. Why are they trying to make Obama into another Reagan? Why not another Jimmy Carter? Or if that’s too extreme another Harry Truman or Franklin Roosevelt? It speaks volumes that they’re trying to convince people that Obama is the reincarnation of Reagan.
A Reagan play written by a guy named Rambo?
How very quintessentially 80′s.
There’s no doubt the man’s life was fascinating, and I’m sure Messrs. Hunt, Rambo and Forster have come up with something exceptional. A lot of pedigree with all these players, and I’m sure the show will be terrific.
And regardless of whichever political prism people look through – some of the comments do seem remarkably ignorant given certain historical contexts (there you go again) – the man who envisioned the “shining city on the hill”, dealing with the likes of Gorbachev, O’Neill, and so on during such tempestuous times, had a very poignant and compelling backstory, and I know many of us are looking forward to seeing it represented in this show.