Tony award-winning screenwriter Matthew Lopez will be in charge of the remake for The Bodyguard, and he shared that one of his requests was to make the protagonist Latina.
First of all, why should there be a remake of The Bodyguard?
There are countless amazing productions made decades ago, and a lot of them are getting remakes. Which brings me back to my initial question, why? Aren’t writers, producers, directors creative enough to make something original?
I had the same question exposed in the new Cinderella movie review, and I fail to find another answer but: money.
With technology stronger than ever, able to create the most vivid scenes and add so much to the stories, we can’t help but wonder, do we need to see one story again and again?
The Bodyguard, starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner, is a classic. Of course, if seen today, cancel culture would find so many things wrong with it, the same way they do about so many jokes in Friends.
Regardless, there’s a remake in the making. Magnificent Matthew Lopez, who just made history as the first Latino to win a Tony award, is taking the story into his own hands, but couldn’t he make something original?
The 44-year-old The Inheritance writer spoke to Variety and shared his one request: “It’s so much fun. When Warner Bros. approached me about the idea, I quickly said I would but I wanted the protagonist to be Latina. They agreed to that.”
He continued: “There’s been a lot of speculation about what I’d bring to the remake and some people were assuming that there’d be a gay storyline to it. Instead of focusing on an established star like the one Whitney Houston played, this is about a young Latina performer who has just become famous. It’s about how her life has changed because she is an overnight sensation. In the 21st century, that means she’s in immediate need of protection. It was important to me to use this opportunity to get Latin faces up on that screen and to get their stories told in a big way.”
So, again, couldn’t this be an original?
