Barbra Streisand 2012 news: Director Barbra Streisand (photo) is reportedly going to work behind the cameras on her first film in 17 years. Skinny and Cat, about the romance between writer Erskine Caldwell (Tobacco Road, God’s Little Acre) and photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White, should start filming in January 2013. Oscar winners Colin Firth (The King’s Speech) and Cate Blanchett (The Aviator) are slated to star.
The source for this information is showbiz411.com, which adds that Linda Yellen wrote the Skinny and Cat screenplay and will also produce the independently financed film.
Barbra Streisand director: ‘controversies’
As a director, Barbra Streisand’s last film was The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996), a (in my view quite enjoyable) romantic comedy-melodrama that was widely panned at the time. Streisand co-starred with Jeff Bridges, but veteran Lauren Bacall was the one who stole the notices and received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her efforts. [Lauren Bacall Best Supporting Actress Oscar loss.]
Prior to The Mirror Has Two Faces, Streisand had directed the musical Yentl (1983), in which she dresses up as a man in order to get a religious education, and Best Picture Academy Award nominee The Prince of Tides (1991). Both Yentl and Prince of Tides led to (in my view unfair) accusations of sexism within the Academy’s Directors Branch, for Streisand failed to receive a Best Director nomination for either movie. (Yentl was also bypassed for Best Picture, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay.)
Linda Yellen’s previous credits as a screenwriter-producer — and director — consist mostly of television fare, including End of Summer (1995), with Jacqueline Bisset and Peter Weller, and last year’s William & Catherine: A Royal Romance, with Dan Amboyer and Alice St. Clair as the royal romancers. Yellen was also a producer of Daniel Mann’s multiple Emmy winner Playing for Time (1980), a Nazi concentration-camp drama starring Vanessa Redgrave and Jane Alexander.
A two-time Oscar winner — as Best Actress for William Wyler’s Funny Girl (tied with Katharine Hepburn for The Lion in Winter); as Best Song co-writer (with Paul Williams) for A Star Is Born‘s "Evergreen" — Barbra Streisand will next be seen on the big screen in Anne Fletcher’s The Guilt Trip, co-starring Seth Rogen.
Another Barbra Streisand movie project
Another Barbra Streisand movie plan is a remake of Gypsy, in which she’s to play the determined Mama Rose. Ethel Merman was Mama on Broadway, but the role went to Rosalind Russell in Mervyn LeRoy’s highly successful 1962 musical co-starring Natalie Wood.
As for Margaret Bourke-White, Farrah Fawcett brought her to life in Lawrence Schiller’s 1989 television movie simply titled Margaret Bourke-White. Frederic Forrest co-starred as Erskine Caldwell. Its sole Emmy nomination was for Best Sound Mixing.
Erskine Caldwell’s Tobacco Road was made into a movie in 1941. John Ford directed Charley Grapewin and Gene Tierney. God’s Little Acre was filmed in 1958. Directed by Anthony Mann, the heavy drama starred Robert Ryan, Aldo Ray, and Tina Louise.
