Steven Spielberg disclosed that before 'Disclosure Day', he was on the verge of collaborating with two-time Academy Award-nominated actor Colman Domingo on a project about the legendary Broadway duo Ira and George Gershwin, as reported by Deadline.
In a conversation with Amy Poehler on the Good Hang Podcast, the director stated that he was in the process of writing and staging Porgy and Bess before abandoning the project. 'I was going to make a movie about Ira and George Gershwin, and I was going to make a movie about the process of writing and staging Porgy and Bess,' Spielberg told Amy Poehler, as quoted by Deadline.
He continued, 'I had a script, and I was excited, and I was casting it. And I was looking for Todd Duncan, who played Porgy, and I met a lot of actors, and when Colman came in to the meeting, that was the first time I met Colman, but I intended, after that meeting, to cast him as Todd Duncan.'
However, for unknown reasons, Spielberg decided not to make the film. 'What happened was, I had actually cast a lot of the movie and then I had a, something that doesn't often happen when I'm that far down the line, but I had a kind of second thought about the project, and I decided not to continue making it. That's the only reason Colman and I didn't work together then,' said Spielberg as quoted by Deadline.
According to Deadline, Porgy and Bess is an adaptation of Dorothy and DuBose Heyward's play (itself an adaptation of the latter's 1925 novel), which tells the story of a disabled Black beggar from Charleston who attempts to rescue Bess from her drug dealer and controlling lover. The well-known and frequently performed show was later adapted into the Samuel Goldwyn-produced 1959 musical drama film starring the legendary Sidney Poitier and Dorothy Dandridge.
However, having remembered the Sing Sing star 'as well as I did,' the Jaws helmer cast him in 2012's Lincoln as 'Private Harold Green'. The two also worked together on 2023's The Colour Purple, which Spielberg produced.
Though Porgy and Bess didn't pan out, Spielberg further explored stage-to-screen adaptations with 2021's West Side Story, which garnered seven Oscar nominations and clinched one for Supporting Actress for Ariana DeBose, as reported by Deadline.
