Zosia Mamet to Play Patti Smith in Robert Mapplethorpe Biopic
A movie about the life of New York photographer Robert Mapplethorpe is in the works. While Matt Smith of Doctor Who fame will be playing the title role, Zosia Mamet, best known as Shoshanna Shapiro on the HBO series Girls, has been cast as his very good friend and former lover, Patti Smith.
The news comes via Deadline, where they also report that the movie will be written and directed by Ondi Timoner, who won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival in 2004 and 2009. The film, which is expected to begin production this summer, has been authorized by the Mapplethorpe Foundation.
Prior to her time on Girls, Mamet had recurring roles on the fourth season of Mad Men and Parenthood. She is the daughter of famed playwright David Mamet, who wrote Glengarry Glen Ross, the Untouchables and About Last Night.
Smith met Mapplethorpe shortly after she moved to New York City in 1967. They fell in love, living together at the famous Chelsea Hotel for several years, and remained close friends when his acknowledgement of his homosexuality broke them up. Mapplethorpe shot the cover photos for several of her albums, including her 1975 debut, Horses. Smith wrote about their life together in 2010's Just Kids. The memoir won the National Book Award for Nonfiction.
Mapplethorpe, who died in 1989 from complications of AIDS, documented the gay and underground BDSM scenes in New York with his photographs. Shortly after his death, his work was brought into the ongoing culture wars when a touring exhibition of his photos raised the question of public funding for art that some might deem obscene.
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