Fin: Can 'Original Sin' be a movie?

Also, a year with no Marvel, Kevin Spacey returns to directing, trading an Oscar for a sports title, remembering a great documentarian, and more in this week's notes column.

Last night I went to the Free Library of Philadelphia to attend a book talk with Philadelphia’s own Jake Tapper and Axios’ Alex Thompson, who were there to discuss their new book, Original Sin, about Joe Biden’s worse-than-originally-thought infirmity and how his inner circle covered it up.

I wrote about the event for National Security Journal here. Based on the talk, and about one-third or so of the book I’ve read so far, the reporting is solid, and the people across the political spectrum who are bad at Tapper and Thompson for various reasons are, for the most part, wrong.

My favorite moment of the night: In the middle of Tapper speaking, someone’s cell phone rang, and the ringtone was “Yakety Sax,” leading Jake to share fond memories of watching The Benny Hill Show on channel 29 when he was growing up. Years from now, I’ll have probably forgotten most of the details of last night’s talk, but I will always remember the “Yakety Sax.”

Anyway, because This is a Movie Newsletter, I should probably address something: Like a lot of bestselling books, Original Sin has gotten some interest from the movies. Per Oliver Darcy’s newsletter Status, “interest is surging for the dramatic rights” for Tapper and Thompson’s book, with the authors “preparing to circulate the manuscript to a select group of producers and filmmakers.”

I’m trying to figure out how, exactly, the story told in Original Sin would work as a movie, because as political stories go, it’s not the most cinematic thing in the world. The president is old, he insists on running for president again anyway, and his advisers enable him.

There’s not really a hero anywhere in the story, nor any real dramatic moments. They could go the All the President’s Men route, and have the journalists be the heroes, but Thompson himself said at the event Thursday that he’s never had any desire to be Woodward and Bernstein- possibly because he’s young and way before their time.

Plus, there’s also a movie called Original Sin, the very un-Biden-like sexy thriller from 2001 with Angelina Jolie and Antonio Banderas.

A year without Marvel

When release dates for movies are announced years in advance, especially for major blockbusters, those should never be taken as gospel. As quite a few people noted, Avengers: Kang’s Dynasty was originally scheduled to come out on May 2, 2025.