Steven Soderbergh’s long-in-the-making Liberace biopic has graduated from “thing that is mentioned in every story about how Michael Douglas is beating cancer and planning for the future” to an actual film with a scheduled start date and everything—though it’s just been confirmed that the film will now be on HBO, thus denying millions of shopping mall moviegoers the chance to see Steven Soderbergh’s Liberace story on the big screen, at long last. Actually, the choice to air it on premium cable rather than give it a wider release really is something of a surprise, given both how much attention the project has received over the years and the A-list cast it’s assembled, which includes Douglas donning mountains of ruffles, fur, and pomade to play the flamboyant pianist, and Matt Damon potentially wearing this thing to play his younger live-in lover, Scott Thorson. Reportedly the decision came about because producer Jerry Weintraub really, really liked the way HBO captured his life in the recent documentary His Way. Whatever. At least it’s finally happening and it has a home—plus a new title, Behind The Candelabra, which is where Liberace and Scott Thorson liked to do it.
Join the discussion...