The movie needed a different director, but it really, REALLY needed a completely different cast. It could have been the final, glorious nail in the coffin of the horrible ‘80s.
Here are my pics, truer to the novel. All of these actors would have been more or less age-appropriate in the early 90s. Substantial parts only.
Anthony Heald as Sherman McCoy, the bumbling WASP bond trader and defendant
Sean Young as Maria Ruskin, the actual driver and Sherman’s mistress
Meg Ryan as Judy McCoy, Sherman’s materialistic wife
Tim Curry as Peter Fallow, British tabloid journalist in NYC
Dennis Franz as Larry Kramer, the ADA prosecutor
David Margulies as Judge Kovitsky
Denis Leary as Tommy Killian, Sherman’s lawyer
William Macy as Detective Martin
Carl Weathers as Reverend Bacon, community activist
Heald has the perfect look right down to the chin, and he plays pompous, clueless people so well. Sean Young is a dark beauty like Maria, is southern and can play a firecracker well.
I wish I could Time Machine Judy Greer back to 1990 because she’d be PERFECT as Sherman’s wife Judy, but without her I think Meg Ryan could do it.
Rev Bacon was very hard to do. There were only a handful of black film actors back then. People talk about woke casting and all that shit today, but we are so much better off in that regard today.
Ok, remember you’re casting this 35 years ago. Who would you pick?