‘Toxic Avenger’ Reboot Casts Kevin Bacon As Villain To Battle Peter Dinklage
Kevin Baconis about to get his hands dirty.
TheTremorsandFootloosestar has been cast in Legendary’sThe Toxic Avenger, a reboot of the ultra-low-budget franchise that began with a 1984 film that inexplicably spawned multiple sequels, an animated series, a comic, and a stage musical.Peter Dinklage(Game of Thrones) has already been cast in the lead role, and Bacon will be playing the villain.
Kevin Bacon is Your New Toxic Avenger Villain
According toThe Hollywood Reporter, Bacon has been hired “to play a slick (and likely over the top) villain” in the new movie, which will be written and directed byMacon Blair, the filmmaker behind the underseen Netflix gemI Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore. Unfortunately, that’s all the information we have about Bacon’s character at the moment, but the “slick” descriptor makes me wonder if the actor might be playing a version of Mayor Belgoody, the secret leader of the town’s crime ring in the original film.
At this point it’s still a little hazy exactly how much this new movie will serve as a pure reboot compared to a remake, but either way, I can easily see Bacon as a charismatic politician who uses his position of power to line his own pockets. He previously played villains in superhero-related movies before, appearing in James Gunn’sSuper(Gunn started his career working at Troma, the company that produced the originalToxic Avenger) and 2011’sX-Men: First Class.
What is The Toxic Avenger About?
THR saysThe Toxic Avengerfollows “a struggling everyman who, when pushed into a vat of toxic waste, is transformed into a mutant freak who must go from shunned outcast to underdog hero as he races to save his son, his friends, and his community from the forces of corruption and greed.” Mitch Cohen played the title character in the first film, which was a trashy little B-movie that has earned cult classic status over the years.
Hollywood has been trying to jumpstart this franchise for more than 10 years now, with people likeAkiva Goldsman,Hot Tub Time MachinedirectorSteve Pink,John Travolta,Arnold Schwarzenegger,Sausage PartydirectorConrad Vernon, andKevin Smithattached at various points since 2010.
Dinklage will play the lead role in the reboot, withJacob Tremblay(Good Boys,Room) andTaylour Paige(Zola,Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom) rounding out the rest of the current cast. Production is set to begin later this month in Bulgaria.Lloyd KaufmanandMichael Herz, who directed the original movie for Troma Entertainment, are on board this version as producers.
