Sacha Baron Cohen, who was previously attached to a Freddie Mercury biopic, seemed to be back onboard with project – until the news was refuted by Queen guitarist Brian May.

Sacha Baron Cohen In Queen Movie?

Queen manager Jim Beach was giving a speech at the Artist & Management Awards in London when he suggested that Cohen would write, direct, produce and star in the biopic about the late Queen frontman.

“You have probably followed the saga of the famous Queen-Freddie Mercury biopic which has been developing in Hollywood for the last seven years,” Beach said. “An important breakthrough is that we have now managed to persuade Sacha Baron Cohen to write, produce and direct this movie — and he has also agreed to star.”

However, May took to his personal website following the awards ceremony to claim that Beach had made the comments about Cohen in jest. “[Jim] said that, in response to enquiries about the progress on the Freddie feature film, that Sacha Baron Cohen had been re-engaged to write, produce, and direct the film, as well as starring in all four major roles! I’m afraid some folks might have taken it seriously!” May wrote.

Back in 2013, May and Roger Taylor came out against Cohen’s casting as Mercury and the Borat actor’s vision of a grittier portrayal of the singer and the band’s past. The two wanted a more family-friendly take on Mercury’s story and felt that Cohen and his past roles would be a distraction to moviegoers.

“In the end, we felt that his presence in the movie would be very distracting. What led us to that conclusion was the last three movies that he’s made — The Dictator, Les Miserables and Hugo,” May told the Daily Mail. “And we thought there has to be no distraction in the Freddie movie — we didn’t think that could really happen with Sacha.”