In an interview with the Orlando Sentinel, writer-director John Lee Hancock provides some interesting background about the casting of Sandra Bullock as Memphian Leigh Anne Tuohy in the movie "The Blind Side."
Hancock's next project, due in 2011, is "The American Can," in which Will Smith plays an unsung hero of Hurricane Katrina.
"She was perfect for this, but she didn't see that right off. She turned me down three times, just because while she liked the script but I think she missed, at first, that Leigh Anne Tuohy is not some woman you could put in a little box. 'Southern Steel Magnolia. I got it.' I had a hard time explaining exactly who Leigh Anne was. Finally, I just said, 'Sandy, you've got to go and meet this woman.' We went down to Memphis, met the real Leigh Anne, who is Southern, Christian, Conservative, with everything that goes with that. But surprising, somebody who defies definition. She took this kid in and looked out for him. And Sandy immediately goes, 'I get it. I get her. I have to do this because she's this complex and this part scares me so much.'"The movie, of course, based loosely on the book of the same name, shows how the well-to-do white Tuohy family took into their home Michael Oher, a severely disadvantaged black teenager who would blossom into a star Ole Miss and Baltimore Ravens left tackle.
Hancock's next project, due in 2011, is "The American Can," in which Will Smith plays an unsung hero of Hurricane Katrina.
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