Will Ferrell is slated to star as John Madden in an upcoming movie about the Hall of Fame coach and broadcaster who also became famous for the football video game that bears his name, according to a Deadline report.
The movie, called “Madden,” will be produced by Amazon and MGM studios and directed by David O’Russell, a five-time Academy Award nominee, Deadline reports. The movie will be based on a Black List script by Cambron Clark, according to Deadline. This film is independent of another project about Madden’s life that is reportedly in the works with Tom Brady as executive producer.
There is no indication when filming on “Madden” will start or when the movie will be released.
Ferrell has a long personal history with sports. The actor studied sports information at Southern California with hopes of becoming a sports broadcaster. He has made numerous appearances for Trojans football games and events. He also has starred in an array of sports movies.
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Adding to John Madden’s legacy
Clearly there is plenty of material to delve into in a feature film about the man whose career involved coaching one of the NFL’s most notorious teams, thriving as a broadcasting and commercial star, and being the creative force behind a highly successful video game.
Madden’s career in football already has been thoroughly reviewed in documentaries. The Hall of Fame coach-turned-broadcaster’s life was explored in the “All Madden” documentary that originally aired on Christmas Day 2021, just three days before the football icon died at the age of 85. NFL Films also featured Madden in an “A Football Life” episode that originally aired in 2017. HBO Sports also aired a documentary in 2003 called “Rebels of Oakland: The A’s, the Raiders, the ’70s” that prominently featured Madden’s Raiders teams.
John Madden in movies
Madden has appeared as himself in two football movies.
Madden, the “Madden Cruiser” and a handful of mid-1990s NFL stars made a cameo in the 1994 movie “Little Giants.” Madden was impressed with a trick play called “The Annexation of Puerto Rico.”
Madden, alongside his longtime broadcasting partner Pat Summerall, called the games of the fictional football team, the Washington Sentinels, in the 2000 movie “The Replacements.”
Will Ferrell’s ties to sports
In addition to starring in a number of sports-related movies, Ferrell is part-owner of Major League Soccer’s Los Angeles FC, which won the MLS Cup in 2022. At his LAFC introductory press conference in January 2016, Ferrell said that he “started playing soccer on the mean streets of Irvine,” and that his wife was an all-conference soccer player at Pomona (Calif.) College and their three sons played soccer.
“To say soccer is a part of our lives is an understatement,” said Ferrell, who also made an appearance at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil to pump up U.S. men’s national soccer team fans.
On March 12, 2015, Ferrell played in five spring training games at nine different positions for 10 different teams in Arizona for a “Funny or Die” special for charity. The one-day professional baseball experience was turned into a documentary, “Ferrell Takes the Field.”
Ferrell’s first sports-related movie, “Kicking & Screaming,” was released in 2005. As Phil Weston, Ferrell’s character takes on the duties of coaching a youth soccer team and eventually convinces Pro Football Hall of Fame player and Super Bowl-winning coach Mike Ditka to help. The relationship goes sour when Weston tells Ditka, “now go get me a juice box.”
“Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby” came out in 2006, with Ferrell playing a NASCAR driver whose favorite catchphrase is “if you ain’t first, you’re last.”
In 2007, Ferrell played rabble-rousing figure skater Chazz Michael Michaels in “Blades of Glory,” in which Michaels teams with Jimmy MacElroy (played by Jon Heder) to form an all-male figure skating team. Fun fact: Starting this year in Canada, ice dance pairs can be comprised of same-sex skaters.
In the 2008 movie “Semi-Pro,” Ferrell played Jackie Moon, a owner/coach/player for the fictional ABA team, the Flint Tropics. In the movie, Ferrell’s character trades a washing machine for Woody Harrelson’s character, Ed Monix. During his 2015 baseball stint, Ferrell was traded to the Chicago Cubs by the Los Angeles Angels for a washing machine, according to Baseball Reference.
