{"id":21780,"date":"2014-09-11T17:09:06","date_gmt":"2014-09-12T00:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/?p=21780"},"modified":"2014-09-11T18:57:13","modified_gmt":"2014-09-12T01:57:13","slug":"morgan-freeman-to-play-an-arab-sheikh-in-ben-hur","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2014\/09\/morgan-freeman-to-play-an-arab-sheikh-in-ben-hur.html","title":{"rendered":"Morgan Freeman to play an Arab sheikh in Ben-Hur<\/i>?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"MorganFreeman\"<\/a>Recent Bible epics like Noah<\/a><\/i> and Exodus: Gods and Kings<\/a><\/i> have been dogged by controversy<\/a> for casting white actors in all the main roles \u2014 or at least in the most prominent roles<\/a>. The makers of the newest version of Ben-Hur<\/a><\/i>, however, may have steered clear of all that by announcing today that the first actor to sign on for the movie is none other than Morgan Freeman.<\/p>\n

Deadline<\/a> reports that Freeman will play \u201cIldarin, the man who teaches the slave Ben-Hur to become a champion caliber chariot racer.\u201d Presumably the name \u201cIldarin\u201d is a variation on \u201cIlderim\u201d, which was the name of the Arab sheikh who sponsored Ben-Hur\u2019s chariots in the original novel<\/a>. In the 1959 film<\/a>, he was played by Hugh Griffith, a Welsh actor in dark make-up who won an Oscar for his performance. In the 2010 mini-series<\/a>, he was played by Art Malik, who hails from Pakistan.<\/p>\n

Last month<\/a>, it was reported that the filmmakers were courting Tom Hiddleston for the part of Judah Ben-Hur, but right now \u201cit\u2019s not clear if he will take part.\u201d No other casting has been announced yet. But the producers are currently looking at shooting the film in Rome<\/a>, and the release date is still set for February 26, 2016.<\/p>\n

Update:<\/b> Just to clarify, it\u2019s certainly possible that Freeman\u2019s character is not<\/i> an Arab sheikh. If the character\u2019s name has changed, then other things about him may have changed, too. But Deadline says the new film is sticking even closer to the book than the 1959 film did, so I suspect the character hasn\u2019t changed all that<\/i> much.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The last actor to play Freeman’s character on the big screen won an Oscar for his performance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1116,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2495,411,2202,2496,629],"class_list":["post-21780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-art-malik","tag-ben-hur","tag-ben-hur-2016","tag-hugh-griffith","tag-morgan-freeman"],"yoast_head":"\nMorgan Freeman to play an Arab sheikh in Ben-Hur?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The last actor to play Freeman's character on the big screen won an Oscar for his performance.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2014\/09\/morgan-freeman-to-play-an-arab-sheikh-in-ben-hur.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Morgan Freeman to play an Arab sheikh in Ben-Hur?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The last actor to play Freeman's character on the big screen won an Oscar for his performance.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2014\/09\/morgan-freeman-to-play-an-arab-sheikh-in-ben-hur.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"FilmChat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-09-12T00:09:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-09-12T01:57:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/files\/2014\/09\/MorganFreeman-194x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Peter T. 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