Ethan Hawke has been tapped to play the part of Nikola Tesla in a new biopic about the Serbia-born inventor that created such a buzz during his lifetime. If you’ve watched The Current War or The Prestige you’ll have likely seen Nicholas Hoult and the late David Bowie play their own versions of Tesla as well. While each man was convincing and played the part with a very dignified air that spoke highly of the real life character it remains to be seen if Hawke can do this same. He’s a well-established actor after all and has been seen in a great number of films in which he’s done fairly well. But the concern is whether or not he is really the man for this particular role.
While Tesla doesn’t seem like he’d be any harder to play for any actor Hawke has almost always been seen to play characters that are either down and out in one way or another or are somehow fresh-faced and a bit naive. Take into account the role of Jake in Training Day, he was an officer looking to make detective that didn’t seem to have a single idea of what went on in the streets and was therefore blindsided by his training officer and what was expected of him. This role was criticized just as any other since it seemed as though he was easily eclipsed by Denzel Washington. But then we go to one of his more recent roles as Goodnight Robicheaux in the remake of The Magnificent Seven, in which he wasn’t so much a disgraced fighter as he was man suffering from a serious case of PTSD, kind like his character in Assault on Precinct 13.
Hawke simply strikes me as the type that’s either playing a character that’s down in the dumps or just blissfully ignorant of what’s going on around him. And as far as the actors that have played Tesla have shown so far the man seemed to be on top of his game quite often and was at the forefront of his field when it came to being innovative and able to contest with the likes of Thomas Edison. I could be wrong and Tesla could have been all over the place at times, which would at the very least give Hawke an in when it came to playing him. Or Hawke could have greatly matured by this time and be able to calm himself down for a role of this magnitude. I won’t ever say that he can’t do it, but it simply seems like it would be a stretch after looking at all he’s done thus far. If this had been several years ago I might have been one of those asking if the producers were being serious in their casting.
As it stands though he’s set to play the lead character and will be showing just what he can do with a serious part once again. It could be something worth watching, More details will be forthcoming since production is set to start this spring.
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