Cher has announced that a biopic about her life is in the works at Universal Pictures. She will co-produce the project, alongside Judy Craymer and Gary Goetzman, who produced the film adaptations of Mamma Mia! – the second of which, 2018’s Here We Go Again, starred Cher.
Cher said that her “dear dear friend” Eric Roth – of Forrest Gump and the most recent A Star Is Born adaptation – will write the screenplay. He worked with Cher on the 1987 legal thriller Suspect.
“Gary and I are thrilled to be working with Cher again and this time bringing her empowering and true-life odyssey to the big screen,” Craymer said in a press release. “One cannot help but be drawn to and inspired by Cher’s larger than life talent, fortitude, unique wit, warmth and vision. Her unparalleled success in music, film and TV has inspired generations. We could not be happier to tell her story to cinema audiences.”
Cher celebrates her 75th birthday on Thursday (20 May). She shared the news of the biopic in characteristic fashion on her Twitter feed, making the announcement 42 minutes after tweeting that she had to take a shower. In response to a fan who said they had been waiting for a Cher film for 50 years, the singer, actor and campaigner said: “I had more life to live.”
During that half century, Cher has sold more than 100m records and waged several musical comebacks – notably launching a solo career after her divorce and subsequent creative split from Sonny Bono, and pioneering the use of Auto-Tune in pop with 1998’s Believe, which won the Grammy award for best dance recording in 2000.
Her filmography includes Silkwood, Mask, The Witches of Eastwick and Moonstruck, for which she won the Academy Award for best actress.
Recently, she co-founded Free the Wild, an organisation aimed at stopping the suffering of wild animals in captivity. Their efforts successfully rescued Kavaan, the world’s “loneliest elephant”, who was confined in a shuttered zoo in Islamabad, Pakistan.
The Cher biopic will follow a recent rash of music films, some more successful than others, and is one of the few high-profile feature films about female musicians. Rocketman, about the life of Elton John, and Judy, about Judy Garland, were met with acclaim.
But the Queen film Bohemian Rhapsody was accused of “straightwashing” the group’s story, The United States vs Billie Holiday was panned for foregrounding violence and degradation, and the David Bowie film Stardust – made without the involvement of Bowie’s estate, or the inclusion of his music – currently holds a 21% rating on criticism aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.
Forthcoming music biopics include projects on Celine Dion, Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Marianne Faithfull, Michael Jackson, Teddy Pendergrass, Bob Marley and Madonna.