James Brown Biopic ‘Get On Up’ Set For October 2014 Release

The James Brown biopic Get On Up will be hitting theaters in fall 2014.

Universal has set the film’s release date as October 17, 2014.

42 star Chadwick Boseman was recently cast in the lead as Brown.

Get On Up is being produced by Imagine Entertainment’s Brian Grazer and Erica Huggins along with Jagged Films’ Mick Jagger and Victoria Pearman. The screenplay is being written by Jez and John-Henry Butterworth.

Grazer has been working on a James Brown biopic since 2001. Actors such as Wesley Snipes and Eddie Murphy were being circled as the potential lead. Murphy went on to play James “Thunder” Early, who was inspired by singers like Brown and Jackie Wilson, in 2006’s Dreamgirls. He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the role.

Taylor, who directed 2011’s The Help, said the film would be shot entirely in Mississippi.

“Every frame will be shot in Mississippi. We’re even doing Paris, France, in Mississippi…. Vietnam, as well, in Mississippi,” he said. Filming will take place in and near Natchez in November and December. In January and February, filming will move to the capital city of Jackson. Taylor grew up in Jackson and now has a home near Natchez, in the southwestern corner of the state.

The Help was also filmed in several places in Mississippi, including Jackson and Greenwood. Taylor said he wanted to develop the film industry in the state.

“I think with all of our hard work, we will soon see great talent rising up from our native soil,” he said.

As far as Jagger’s involvement in the film, Taylor said he has always been cognizant of Brown’s impact on the way people dance.

“James Brown, really, was the first real dancer that broke the ground of how people move,” Taylor said. “And Mick Jagger has complimented that and tipped his hat to that forever.”

“The hardest working man in show business,” James Brown died on December 25, 2006, from congestive heart failure resulting from complications from pneumonia. He was 73. The film’s title, Get On Up, is taken from his song, “(Get Up I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine.”

[Photo credit: Heinrich Klaffs / Flickr]