David Farnor | On 14, Jul 2021

Nic Cage has pulled out of Amazon’s high-profile Joe Exotic series, with the whole project now potentially axed.

Exotic is a mulleted, gun-toting polygamist and country western singer who presides over an Oklahoma roadside zoo. He became famous last year when Netflix released the documentary series Tiger King, which became a veritable pop culture sensation, thanks to its outlandish central figure.

The TV world was quick to react, with Kate McKinnon working on a series (based on the Wondery podcast called Joe Exotic) for NBC, with McKinnon co-starring as rival big cat collector Carole Baskin. Amazon, meanwhile, picked up a rival series based on a Texas Monthly article called Joe Exotic: A Dark Journey Into the World of a Man Gone Wild.

Now, though, as Tiger King fades into the collective digital memory of Netflix subscribers, Nic Cage has revealed to Variety that he is no longer stepping into Joe Exotic’s shoes.

“We should clear the record,” he said. “I read two excellent scripts, which I did think were excellent, but I think Amazon ultimately felt that it was material that had become past tense because it took so long for it come together. They felt at one point that it was lightning in a bottle, but that point has since faded into the distance and it’s no longer relevant.”

Whether the project finds another star, and another home, is unknown.

 

Amazon picks up Nic Cage Joe Exotic series

12th September 2020

Amazon has picked up the scripted series about Joe Exotic starring Nic Cage.

Exotic is a mulleted, gun-toting polygamist and country western singer who presides over an Oklahoma roadside zoo. He became famous this year when Netflix released a documentary series, Tiger King, which became a veritable pop culture sensation, thanks to its outlandish central figure.

While the world debated who could play such a man in a film or TV show, the news emerged that CBS TV Studios and Imagine TV Studios had already lined up Nic Cage for a project based not on the Netflix series but on a Texas Monthly article called Joe Exotic: A Dark Journey Into the World of a Man Gone Wild.

Written by Leif Reigstad, the article was optioned in June 2019 and has now been picked up by Amazon Studios. The show will explore how Joe became Joe Exotic and how he “lost himself to a character of his own creation”, reports Variety.

Dan Lagana will serve as showrunner, with Paul Young executive producing via Make Good Content. Imagine’s Brian Grazer and Samie Kim Falvey will also executive produce, alongside Cage via Saturn Films.

The project will be the first regular TV role of Cage’s career and is the second scripted series in development centred around Joe Exotic, with Kate McKinnon’s series – based on the Wondery podcast called Joe Exotic with McKinnon to play Joe Exotic’s Carole Baskin – picked up by NBC, its streaming service Peacock and USA Network.

 

Nicolas Cage to star in scripted Tiger King series

4th May 2020

Nicolas Cage has been crowned the Tiger King, taking on the lead role in a series based on the now-famous Joe Exotic.

Exotic is a mulleted, gun-toting polygamist and country western singer who presides over an Oklahoma roadside zoo. He became famous this year when Netflix released a documentary series, Tiger King, which became a veritable pop culture sensation, thanks to its outlandish central figure. Since then, the subject of who would play him in a film or TV show has been raging online. Today, Variety has confirmed that the answer, of course, is Nicolas Cage.

Cage has been cast in an untitled eight-episode series that is based on a Texas Monthly article called Joe Exotic: A Dark Journey Into the World of a Man Gone Wild. Written by Leif Reigstad, the article was optioned in June 2019 by CBS TV Studios, which will produce the show alongside Imagine Television Studios. Dan Lagana is already on-board as writer and showrunner, under his overall deal with CBS, while Imagine’s Brian Grazer and Samie Kim Falvey will executive produce, alongside Cage (Saturn Films) and Texas Monthly’s Scott Brown and Megan Creydt.

The series will follow Joe, the eccentric, exotic Oklahoma zookeeper who battles to keep his park even at the risk of his own sanity. The role marks Cage’s first regular TV role, after a career spanning all manner of feature films. He recently made his animated feature debut with Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse.

The show is the second to be set around the now-iconic world of the Netflix docuseries, with Kate McKinnon already at work on a series based on the Wondery podcast called Joe Exotic. McKinnon, who is exec-producing that project, is set to star as Carole Baskin, but has yet secured a writer to take the project on.

Which series gets to our screens first, they cement Netflix’s ability to turn little-known stories into household names.

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