Ray Winstone Joins Soderbergh’s Cleo

While talking with MTV, Steven Soderbergh revealed that Ray Winstone (Beowulf) will play Julius Ceaser in the filmmaker’s upcoming Cleopatra musical, Cleo.

The film stars Catherine Zeta Jones as the title character and will be shot in 3D and feature music written by the indie rock band Guided by Voices. The script is by James Greer, a former bass player for the band and an author. Soderbergh told the following to MTV:

“I’ve always wanted to do a musical. All the ones that were coming along just weren’t for me. I wanted to do a real rock n roll musical like ‘Tommy.’ During my research it appeared that most were female driven. So I started thinking about female protagonists. I was thinking about Catherine. It doesn’t take too long to think about Catherine and famous female historical figures to get to get to Cleopatra.”

“…It’s like an Elvis musical in a way. It’s not serious. I mean it’s historically pretty accurate but its sort of like ‘Viva Las Vegas’ meets ‘Tommy.’”

Hugh Jackman is close to finishing a deal to play the Egyptian queen’s lover, Marc Antony. Soderbergh plans to start filming Cleo in April.