Will Sting’s life ever receive the movie treatment, like Queen and Elton John‘s lives did? Not if he has any say in the matter.
The musician is currently starring in a Los Angeles production of his stage musical, The Last Ship, which tells the story of his early years growing up in a shipbuilding town in Northern England. He tells The Hollywood Reporter that he has no interest in being the subject of a big-screen biopic like Bohemian Rhapsody or Rocketman.
“Absolutely not,” he says. “I just don’t think I want to. I’m telling my story in an artistic way.”
Sting — who wrote the music and lyrics for The Last Ship and plays the foreman of a Newcastle shipyard in the musical — explains that he’d rather have control of his own narrative.
“[The Last Ship] is a metaphor. This is a story about me,” he says. “I’m in this play in many ways, probably more than I intended to. But the character I’m playing is built on composites of people like my father, uncles, people I was brought up with. That’s the way I want to do it, rather than somebody going, ‘What’s the arc of Sting’s life?’ I haven’t finished it yet.”
He does concede, however, that he wouldn’t mind seeing The Last Ship being made into a film.
“I enjoy making films, so yes I’d do more of them,” he says. “And could this be a movie? Absolutely. It has an epic quality about it…So I’m hoping we’re in Hollywood, someone will come to the show and go, ‘Ah, this will make a good film.’”
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