Hey! Ho! Lets Go!

(Above: From L-R Dee Dee, Tommy, Johnny and Joey Ramone)

Uh-oh. Consider me seriously worried. The specialty division (yes, that’s actually a division) of Fox Searchlight is in negotiations to make a movie about the Ramones. For those of you playing at home the Ramones are my favourite band EVER and although the thought of a movie based on their lives does excite me, their status as the founding fathers of punk rock and cultural rebellion is so sacred, I don’t want to see it fucked up on screen. Also, I’ve been known to hang out on a rooftop with a sniper rifle looking for people wearing Ramones logo t-shirts without even knowing any of their music!!! GAH! I hate those posers.

Anyway, deep breath, count backwards from 10. The film is going to be based on the soon to be published memoir I Slept With Joey Ramone written by the musician’s brother, Mickey Leigh and Ramones chronicler Legs McNeil. It would feature the band’s tunes, obviously. A former executive producer of Everybody Loves Raymond, Rory Rosegarten, bought the rights to the book several years ago and most importantly, he bought the rights to the music. So Searchlight are working closely with him to try and close a deal, a process that hasn’t finished yet say people close to the project.

I Slept With Joey Ramone is considered the most film-worthy piece of source material and centers on the life of Joey Ramone (aka Jeffrey Hyman) who was the lead singer and key creative force behind the iconic punk act. To be frank, this is such a complicated tale I don’t think the Ramones on the big screen could be done any better than the 2004 documentary End Of The Century which is an incredible, comprehensive piece of filmmaking.

A bit of background on the Ramone; they were formed in Queens, in 1974 by John Cummings, Jeffrey Hyman, Thomas Erdelyi and Douglas Colvin as teenagers who changed their names to Johnny, Joey, Tommy and Dee Dee Ramone. They went on to become the fathers of the punk movement and cult symbols, still recognizable today. They attained little commercial airplay but had a huge cult following with songs like Blitzkrieg Bop, I Wanna Be Sedated, Rockaway Beach and my personal favourite, The KKK Took My Baby Away. They’re cited as a huge influence in modern music with bands such as The Clash, The Sex Pistols and U2 all naming them as inspiration. They famously broke up in 1996 due to infighting and other members included Marky, C.J. and Richie Ramone who also played with the band at various points. They coined the phrase `Gabba Gabba Hey’ which is commonly used amongst rad people aka myself.

And that’s just skimming the top of their sordid history. On top of that Dee Dee, one of the key songwriters, worked as a male prostitute in his late teens/early twenties, battled a lifelong drug addiction and tried his hand at a career as a white rapper. Johnny ended up running off with, and later marrying, Joey’s girlfriend, an act which the pair never quite got over and that fuelled many feuds (besides their obvious political differences; Joey was very liberal and Johnny very conservative). Joey also overcame a severe case of obsessive-compulsive disorder, which hindered him earlier in his career. Oh, and then there was that time the Ramones worked with Phil Spector on the End Of The Century album and he made them play the opening rift of a song 400 times before holding them all at gunpoint until they got the composition `just right’. I guess they should consider themselves lucky they didn’t end up like Lana Clarkson or worse, one of Spectors discarded hair pieces . . .ew.

The Ramones, all of which have died in the last decade, besides Tommy, have been on the silver screen before in the awesome cult-classic Rock ‘n Roll High School, a teen-rebel comedy made in `79 which sees the band star as musical mavericks who help teens face off against a disciplinarian principal. Howard Stern last year signed on to produce a remake of the pic which is almost as disturbing as the guy behind Everybody Loves Raymond wanting to make their biopic. It’s just an all around disturbing extravaganza.

So, that pretty much sums up the Ramones movie so far . . .except for casting, director and a heck of a lot more information. But hey, this is everything that’s available for now so lower those pitchforks. Hopefully the future of this movie will mimic the storyline from the third season of Entourage where a Ramones biopic gets buried in studio development after Ari screws over one too many people. Boom.

Thoughts? Who do you reckon would make a good Ramone in the biopic? Personally I’d love to see British rising star Andrew Garfield in there, perhaps as Dee Dee (even though Dee Dee bares an uncanny resemblance to Steve Zahn). He would make a great Dee Dee and he definitely proved himself as an amazing performer in The Red Riding Trilogy: 1974 earlier this year. Jesse Eisenberg as a Ramone would also be awesome, as he could pretty much slot in anywhere. And how could I not mention the character-actor brilliance of Joseph Gordon-Levitt! You know he would tear up any part he was given but I say cast him as Joey, he could handle the difficulties of playing someone so complex. I wouldn’t mind seeing Jack White try his chops at acting, he can literally do everything else so odds are he could be good at this too. Jack White to play a Ramone, hmm it could work. I’m stumped on any other ideas though.