Sean Penn's back on top of the world right now, a double Oscar winner and enjoying a status, possibly for the first time, as a nice guy, given his elegant treatment of Mickey Rourke from the Oscar stage. So while he has his pick of roles and directions to go from here, Penn is choosing a role that seems kind of surprising-- the husband of the main character in a political drama.
And it's not just your average main character-- it's Valerie Plame, the outed CIA agent who will be played by Naomi Watts in Fair Game, an adaptation of Plame's memoir. Variety reports that Penn is in talks to play Ambassador Joseph Wilson, Plame's husband who wrote op-ed columns criticizing the Bush administration's of the Iraq war. Plame's secret CIA status was later compromised as a retaliation against Wilson by senior members of the Bush administration.
There's no deal yet in place for Penn, but he'd be teaming up with big names like Watts and director Doug Liman. And we all know he has his liberal politics firmly in place, which makes this movie a good thematic fit for him. But is Penn, so accustomed to being a star, really ready to take on the "supportive husband" role? Or is the part much bigger than the real life story suggests? At this point, with the new Oscar firmly in hand, Penn can be confident we're ready to watch him do just about anything.
