Out director Bryan Singer, whose films include Superman Returns, X-Men, X2, Valkyrie and The Usual Suspects, is attached to direct HBO adaptation of Bye, Bye Life: The Loves and Deaths of Bob Fosse, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Singer will be plenty busy until production of the film actually begins (no dates have been set). He is in preproduction on New Line’s Jack the Giant Killer and is also is producing X-Men: First Class along with Lauren Shuler Donner.

The THR article describes Fosse as an actor, dancer, choreographer and stage and screen director, He presented a version of his life in his autobiographical 1979 feature All That Jazz. That Oscar-winning film starred Roy Scheider as a hard-living choreographer/director determined to push the envelope.After several early film appearances in such movies as Kiss Me Kate, Fosse moved to Broadway, where he choreographed such shows as The Pajama Game and Damn Yankees. On Yankees, he met his future wife, dancer Gwen Verdon.

Fosse created his own, immediately recognized jazz dance style, full of bowler hats, jazz hands, angular hip thrusts and shrugging shoulders. On Broadway, he went on to direct and choreograph such shows as Redhead, Sweet Charity, Pippin and Chicago.

He made his film debut as a director with the 1969 movie version of Sweet Charity, starring Shirley MacLaine. His second feature, Cabaret, starred Liza Minnelli and won eight Oscars. In addition to All That Jazz, his other feature credits include Lenny, which starred Dustin Hoffman as comedian Lenny Bruce, and Star 80, in which Mariel Hemingway played murdered Playboy centerfold Dorothy Stratten.

Comments

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2 Remarks

1. January 21st, 2011 at 5:04 pm
   Stuart says:

   Best Picture is not one of the 8 Oscars that “Cabaret” won in 1972. It was nominated for a total of 10 Academy Awards but lost Best Picture to “The Godfather”. Not such a bad picture to lose to either!

2. January 22nd, 2011 at 4:52 pm
   John says:

   FYI Greg, Cabaret did NOT win best picture that year, it went to the Godfather. Facts, Facts, Facts.