Colin Farrell may not be a big leading man, but you cannot really tell by looking at his resume as the actor seems to land high profile roles one after the other. This is especially true after the trailers started to hit for his Total Recall reboot. That said, this new addition to the actor’s slate is not one of those roles, but rather a supporting gig behind the likes of Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson in Saving Mr. Banks.
For those who have not heard about this project, it is a favorite of the trades because it is essentially about the wooing of an author (P.L. Travers) by Walt Disney for the film rights to Mary Poppins. Those roles will be played by Thompson and Hanks respectively which gives Farrell the role of Travers’ long-gone father who was the inspiration for a major character in the book and film, Mr. Banks.
The movie will aim to strike a serious tone as the movie was apparently butchered in Travers’ mind by Disney due to the fact that Mary Poppins played such a huge role in the author’s personal life. We will find out more about the studio’s real intentions regarding this film in the near future, but do not expect animation to be seeped into sequences as that element in Mary Poppins specifically lead to the Travers-Disney fallout after the film’s release.
[Deadline]