Scarlett Johansson is . . . Courtney Love?

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Scarlett Johansson is . . . Courtney Love?

By our guest blogger, Marie Biondolillo

According to MSNBC, a Kurt Cobain biopic is in the works . . . and Courtney Love has some interesting casting ideas.

The Hole frontwoman would like to see herself played by none other than buxom Realdoll Scarlett Johansson.

Now, some might say that Johansson is too attractive to play Love. But I’m old enough to remember Love in the late ‘90s, back when she was playing Althea in “The People Vs. Larry Flynt.” (Yes, this makes me 900 years old, in Internet years.) It was not so long ago that Love was kind of hot, so Scar Jo isn’t the wildest casting choice on that front.

The real problem is that Courtney Love is crazy as balls, whereas Scar Jo is one of the most boring people who ever lived. Watching Scar Jo act is literally more boring than watching a snail cross your yard, since you know that the snail at least has some sort of goal in mind. The same cannot be said of Scar Jo--she’s one of the most static, opaque, emotionless actresses ever to grace the silver screen. She kind of just sits there, emitting the equivalent charisma of a sack of potatoes (perhaps less, since potatoes contain many delicious possibilities, whereas Scar Jo can neither be fried nor mashed.)

Were Scar Jo to play Courtney, it would be the most unconvincing portrayal since Katharine Hepburn played a heroic Chinese peasant woman named Jade in the unfortunately named World War II drama “Dragon Seed.” Say what you will about Love, but you can’t deny that she’s an unpredictable, anarchic personality. This is a woman who interrupted her own interview to huck a shoe at Madonna during a live MTV Video Music Awards broadcast. Scar Jo is just too inert to pull off Courtney convincingly--it’s like casting Tom Hanks to play Iggy Pop.

Who would be better than Scar Jo in this role? Well, practically anybody. Emilie de Ravin comes to mind—after all, if the last six seasons of “Lost” have taught us anything, they’ve taught us that Claire is good at yelling at junkie musicians and rocking crazy-lady hair. I could also see a dynamic, live-wire actress like Parker Posey or Christina Ricci in the role—they might not look much like Love, but stick either one of them in a ripped slip, rat’s nest blonde wig and smeared mascara, and they’ll do.

The essence of Love is her yelling and tics, not her looks. A good actress would capture Love’s spastic way of moving, the intelligence buried beneath her tweaker’s mannerisms, her impatient narcissism. In the right hands, it could be a great role—as powerful as Jessica Lange’s performance as Frances Farmer in “Frances,” or Angelina Jolie’s turn as the semi-fictional Lisa Rowe in “Girl, Interrupted.”

Say, what’s Sharon Stone up to lately?

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