Bruno star Sacha Baron Cohen
will take on another gay role, playing Queen frontman Freddie
Mercury in an upcoming biopic, Nikki
Finke's Deadline
New York
reported.
The lead singer of the legendary band
Queen, who died in 1991 from complications from AIDS, is
considered a music legend.
It is the third gay role for Cohen, who
played a gay Formula One driver in the 2006 comedy Talladega
Nights. Cohen starred as Bruno in last year's film by the same
name. Gay Austrian fashion reporter Bruno sets off to America to
become “the biggest Austrian superstar since Hitler” after he is
fired from is own television show, Funkytime with Bruno.
Surviving members of the band are
reportedly backing the film, which is being written by Frost/Nixon
screenwriter Peter Morgan.
“Queen is one of the greatest
rock bands of all time, and a music brand all unto itself,” Graham
King, an executive at GK Film, which will distribute the film, said
in a statement. “Freddie Mercury was an awe-inspiring performer,
so with Sacha in the starring role coupled with Peter's screenplay
and the support of Queen, we have the perfect combination to
tell the real story behind their success.”