Creating the rare sentence that includes both the words “Jesus Christ” and “Joaquin Phoenix” but doesn’t end with “knock it off,” the Inherent Vice and Her star might be playing the famed crucifixion victim and low-cost bread and seafood vendor in an upcoming film. According to Deadline, Phoenix is eyeing a role in Mary Magdalene, starring opposite Carol’s Rooney Mara as the eponymous washer of feet.
The Biblical biopic is being directed by Garth Davis, who presumably looked at Phoenix, then looked at Jesus, and then shrugged and decided one mythological figure with a tendency to come back from the dead was ultimately as good as another. Davis is a relative newcomer, who just got done directing Mara in the real-life missing child story Lion. Phoenix, meanwhile, starred in the latest Woody Allen movie, Irrational Man, and was recently reported to be teaming back up with his old collaborator and fellow prankmaster Casey Affleck for an upcoming Western.