While things haven’t exactly been going smoothly for director Jose Padilha’s RoboCop reboot lately, the acquisition of Michael Keaton (Batman) as the villain will surely go a long way to remedy that. Hugh Laurie (House, M.D.) was previously attached to play the antagonist but talks recently broke down. Keaton would be playing Raymond Sellars, the CEO of Omnicorp, the corporation that builds RoboCop. The reboot of Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 cult classic stars Joel Kinnaman in the title role. Hit the jump for more on the remake and to read what Padilha had to say about Keaton coming on board.
Deadline reports that Keaton will star in RoboCop as the villain, a role that was previously thought to go to Clive Owen after Laurie had passed. Here’s what the director had to say about the veteran actor joining his production:
“Michael is the final addition to the amazing cast we have assembled for this film and it is so great to have the last puzzle piece in place. It is thrilling that everything has come together to bring this innovative new vision of RoboCop to life. We’ve got a great script, a great cast, some killer ED-209’s and I can’t wait to get Alex Murphy back on the streets.”
Some of that cast Padilha mentioned includes Samuel L. Jackson, Gary Oldman and Abbie Cornish. The picture is set to start production next month with a release date scheduled for August 9th, 2013. Be sure to keep up with our continuing coverage of the RoboCop remake as production moves along.
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Hope the movies ends up being good and Keaton returns to the limelight. Such and underrated actor…
This is terrific news, as far as I’m concerned. Even if the film turns out to be as big of a mess as it sounds like, more Michael Keaton is never a bad thing.
OH MY GOD. BEST CASTING NEWS IN YEARS….
Michael Keaton is so terribly underrated, I’ve been a longtime fan of his for a long time since Night Shift in the 80s! I know he’ll knock this one OUT!
fck yeaz!
I think Michael Keaton is a much better choice than Hugh Laurie, much as I love Hugh Laurie. It’s too soon for Laurie to play another satiric self-absorbed character after so many years as House. As an audience, we’d have only been watching his antics as “Dr. House’, not good for the movie or for Laurie as an actor.
i think this movie is going to surprise lots of people.
Awesome but why the hell isn’t he playing Clarence Boddicker? seems like a perfect fit…unless boddicker isnt in the movie…either way Red Foreman is awesome
Let’s get nuts.
Excellent move! I like Keaton. Really a terrific villain
Don’t go chasing waterfalls
Why make the assumption that this particular character will be a satiric and self absorbed villain? I know,. are there any other kind in these kind of movies? Actually I prefer Hugh Laurie, because I think this would not even be close to House in characterization. I find Hugh Laurie to be a much more creative and inspired actor than Keaton.
As I have no idea of what to expect from this movie I only came here to say that he lived long enough to see himself become the villain !
Keaton will be a great villain. He was super in Pacific Heights.
Guess we know why they will continue making unnecessary remakes, because morons like the posters above will keep seeing them.
I’m surprised Oldman is willing to play in another movie with a liberal, possibly political, theme after what happened with The Contender.