Brian May has said he believes Sacha Baron Cohen was ‘too recognisable’ to play Freddie Mercury in a prospective biopic about the iconic frontman, adding to bandmate Roger Taylor‘s assertion that Baron Cohen’s involvement was causing the project to become a ‘joke’.
“It seemed like a good idea in the beginning but the truth is, he’s too recognisable,” May told the Daily Mirror. “He’s very much a style and a character. I think that he would have been very distracting. That’s the conclusion we came to.”
Sacha Baron Cohen’s departure from the long-delayed movie, thought to be simply entitled Mercury and to have a closing act which focuses on Queen’s 1985 Live Aid performance, was confirmed in July. “We felt Sacha probably wasn’t right,” Taylor later told Mojo Magazine. “We didn’t want it to be a joke. We want people to be moved.”
Since then, British actors Daniel Radcliffe and Dominic Cooper have been linked with the high profile role, though as yet no official replacement has been confirmed.