Over the years famous US Presidents are given the movie biopic treatment from Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln to Oliver Stone’s Nixon. And now it’s Ronald Reagan’s turn in a film that charts through his Hollywood career right into his 1980s. Dennis Quaid has been cast as the 40th president having previously played Bill Clinton in HBO movie The Special Relationship.
Quaid is a registered independent who has supported both Republican and Democrat candidates in the past, but says Reagan is his favourite president.
In a new interview, the 66-year-old admitted he was simultaneously surprised, honoured and terrified to be offered the role.
He said: “I didn’t understand why they were offering me Ronald Reagan because I just didn’t see it.
“I admired him so much, and so I had a chill of fear go down my spine when I was offered it.”
READ MORE: Nicholas Cage ‘worried being offered role in Reagan movie will INFURIATE liberal Hollywood’
However, Down thought being asked to audition for The Iron Lady was a prank at first.
She told Daily Mail: “My husband [US director Don FauntLeRoy] got an email saying, ‘We’d like Lesley-Anne to read a scene as Margaret Thatcher…’ and I said, ‘Oh for God’s sake, this is not April Fool’s Day! Stop it!’
“He said, ‘No, honey, this is serious’. Don admitted, ‘It is a bit of a stretch’ and I said, ‘A stretch? Is it a comedy?’
“He explained, ‘No, it’s a proper movie about Ronald Reagan’. And, because it was so ridiculous, he said, ‘You’ve gotta do it!’”
On her portrayal of Thatcher, Down said: “[It] won’t be the quintessential portrayal, I don’t think I looked like Thatcher at all.”
Reagan is based on conservative author Paul Kengor’s The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism.
Jon Voight co-stars as KGB agent Viktor Novikov, while Robert Davi will play Leonid Brezhnev.
Reagan will be released in cinemas in early 2022.
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