23 May 2011
David Mamet will write and direct an HBO Films project about pop record producer Phil Spector, who was convicted of murder in 2009, Variety reported. If the deal goes through, Bette Midler will play a defense attorney and 2011 Tony Award nominee Al Pacino will play Spector.
The trade paper also reports that Jeffrey Tambor (La Cage aux Folles, "Arrested Development") will play another defense lawyer in the film, which will focus on Spector and attorney Linda Kenney Baden (played by Midler).
Mamet, Pacino and Barry Levinson are executive producers. The project has not been officially announced.
Midler began on Broadway as a young actress in Fiddler on the Roof and rose to fame in clubs, concerts, on records and in films. Pacino is a 2011 Best Actor Tony nominee for playing Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. Mamet is the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of American Buffalo, Glengarry Glen Ross, Speed-the-Plow, Race and more.
Spector produced records by girl groups of the 1960s and later produced for Ike and Tina Turner, The Beatles, John Lennon and more.
http://www.playbill.com/news/article/151117-David-Mamet-and-Bette-Midler-Attached-to-HBO-Movie-About-Phil-Spector?sms_ss=twitter&at_xt=4ddae97a88415c9a,0