Nicolas Cage to play Joe Exotic in violent merger of manic energy

Ever since Netflix’s Tiger King documentary became an overnight sensation back in March, there’s been speculation and fan-casting for what felt like an inevitable dramatization. Who could play a character as manic, eccentric, and inescapably in debt as Joe Exotic?

Like little bleached bangs, the answer was in front of our eyes the entire time: Nicolas Cage.

Variety reports that Cage has signed on to star as the big-cat antihero in a new series from Imagine Television and CBS Television Studios—who had the foresight to option the rights to the Texas Monthly article “Joe Exotic: A Dark Journey Into the World of a Man Gone Wild” last June.

American Vandal showrunner and Zach Stone Is Gonna Be Famous creator Dan Lagana is set to serve as writer, showrunner, and executive producer on the yet-untitled series.

Incidentally, this is different than both the dramatization that has Kate McKinnon attached to play husband murderer Carole Baskin and the one Rob Lowe will supposedly star in. So bad news for those two, because this one has Nic fuckin’ Cage as goddamn Joe Exotic.

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