Taylor Swift has been taking small steps into the movie industry over the past few years, but it looks like what could have been her big break is no more...for now. The former country singer had been in talks to play Joni Mitchell in an upcoming biopic, but just the other day Mitchell made clear she was not okay with the decision, and made sure those involved with the film knew so.
"I squelched that" Mitchell said in a recent interview. "I said to the producer, 'All you've got is a girl with high cheekbones.' It's just a lot of gossip, you don't have the great scenes."
The folk singer apparently isn’t very happy with the book that the film would have based off of either. Written by Sheila Weller, Girls Like Us looks at the impact of singers Carly Simon, Carol King, and Mitchell, but according to the latter, it takes more than a few liberties.
"There's a lot of nonsense about me in books. . .assumptions, assumptions, assumptions."
Mitchell reportedly not only said no to Swift playing her, but the entire project, refusing to grant the rights to her name and likeness. While there are ways around a famous face disagreeing with a project, the film’s movement has stalled, and only time will tell if it can get back off the ground again.
Swift has been talking about the role for some time now, first mentioning it over two years ago, back in April of 2012. Casting rumors had just begun, and while nobody would officially comment on her signing on to the role, it looked for a while like the picture and Swift’s involvement was going to happen.
The biopic would have been her first lead role in a major film, but Taylor has acted before, and seems poised and ready for more. She made her first appearance (as someone other than Taylor Swift) in the movie Valentine’s Day, amongst an enormous cast of other famous faces. Next, she took on a voice-over part in the Dr. Seuss tale The Lorax. Earlier this year she also had a small role in the film adaptation of Lois Lowry’s drama The Giver, which was met with mixed reviews.
Aside from the would-be film, both women are keeping busy in the musical world. Swift just released her 1989 album, which went on to sell almost 1.3 million copies in its opening week, racking up the biggest single-week sales figure for a woman in over a decade. Just a few weeks later she became the first woman to replace herself at number one on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.
Mitchell stopped putting out new music in 2007, but her relevancy only increases as time goes on. That year, she won the coveted Grammy for Album of the Year when Herbie Hancock’s collection of covers River: The Joni Letters was selected for the prize, as she was featured on one of the tracks. She also just released a remastered greatest hits collection entitled Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting To Be Danced earlier this week.
