Daniel Radcliffe to play Weird Al in a new biopic

I do love Weird Al. His parodies have been around for most of my life, and my daughter also loves him. In fact, he was her first proper music concert a few years ago and he has led her to delve into the various bands and musicians he has parodied.

Daniel Radcliffe (The Lost City, Harry Potter franchise) will be playing “Weird Al” Yankovic in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, a Roku Original biopic from Funny or Die and Tango that will be available for streaming exclusively on The Roku Channel.

Deadline had the news that Yankovic and Eric Appel wrote the film, with the latter set to direct. Appel directed the short film of the same name for the production company back in 2010, which you can watch below.

Yankovic is producing alongside Mike Farah, Joe Farrell and Whitney Hodack for Funny Or Die, and Tim Headington, Lia Buman and Max Silva for Tango. Appel is exec producing with Funny Or Die’s Henry Muñoz III and Tango’s Neil Shah.

“When Weird Al first sat me down against my will and told me his life story, I didn’t believe any of it,” admitted Appel, “but I knew that we had to make a movie about it.”

“When my last movie UHF came out in 1989, I made a solemn vow to my fans that I would release a major motion picture every 33 years, like clockwork. I’m very happy to say we’re on schedule. And I am absolutely thrilled that Daniel Radcliffe will be portraying me in the film,” said Yankovic. “I have no doubt whatsoever that this is the role future generations will remember him for.”

“There clearly aren’t enough biopic movies about famous musicians and we were excited to shine a light on the incredibly true, unexaggerated story of Weird Al,” said Roku’s Head of Original Scripted Programming, Colin Davis. “This is sincerely the ultimate combination of talent, creativity, and friends, coming together to make something genuinely funny and we could not be prouder to call this film a Roku Original.”

“I am excited that my first project as the owner of Funny Or Die Studios is to help bring the story of ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic to the screen,” added Muñoz III, who serves as Funny Or Die’s Chairman and executive producer. “Weird Al is a comic genius and his impact on pop culture, his mastery of the music video, his award-winning music and his incredible life are a perfect fit for the talented producers at FOD.”

“We are honored to partner with Roku, Tango and our director Eric Appel on this important movie,” said Muñoz III in closing. “WEIRD has brought together a weird and wonderful team of creative people, to tell the story of a man who has made people laugh and sing across the world.”

Production will kick off in Los Angeles early next month.

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