5 Ways to Make the Proposed Ramones Biopic Work

Fox Searchlight is reportedly circling a project based on the life, times and influence of punk's founding fathers the Ramones. On one hand, this isn't really any different than a toy or comic-book adaptation designed to move millions of dollars' worth of merchandise to a new generation of jaded filmgoers. On the other, a Ramones film has potential! Consider five key ways this movie might be able to outmaneuver cynicism on its way to viewers hearts:

1. Cast an unknown as Joey. Everybody remembers the Entourage subplot in which Ari Gold botches the deal that could have placed Vincent Chase in the fictional Joey Ramone biopic I Wanna Be Sedated. Of course no traditional leading man could credibly pull off any of the motley Ramones -- least of all lead singer Joey, the Queens kid whose gangly, homely style changed rock just as much as his teetering croon and pinched staccato yelp. Searchlight previously held open casting calls for this year's Biggie Smalls film Notorious, planting Brooklyn rapper and movie newcomer Jamal Woolard in the lead role en route to a $40 million worldwide gross. Sometimes the stars sell the music (Walk the Line), and sometimes the music sells the stars. This would be one of the latter cases.

2. End it before Rock 'n' Roll High School. This film would be based largely on I Slept With Joey Ramone, a memoir by Joey's brother Mickey Leigh and punk-lit oracle Legs McNeil. I haven't read it, and I don't know where the authors cut off the band's story, but the Ramones' original, 1979 big-screen breakthrough Rock 'n' Roll High School is less a plot point in their overall arc than the beginning of a second, mildly disappointing career. Both a swan song to iconoclasm (it's a Roger Corman film, for Christ's sake) and a enduringly fascinating cult curio (Howard Stern is producing a remake), it's too individual and too symbolic to make a jokey, teaching-Joey-to-act sequence stick. Yes, we'll miss Phil Spector pulling a gun on Dee Dee during the End of the Century sessions, but it's better to keep it to the roots and...

3. Showcase their early ineptitude. Clinton Heylin's punk/new-wave chronicle From the Velvets to the Voidoids features a funny anecdote from Richard Hell, the legendary wild-man poet/songwriter who, with Tom Verlaine, once auditioned Dee Dee Ramone to play bass in their band the Neon Boys: "Tom would say, 'We'll play a C,' and [Dee Dee] went from fret to fret, he would look up with these questioning eyes. He'd look up and we'd shake our heads." He'd advanced to rudimentary songwriting by the time he met up with Johnny -- a garage-band alum -- and Joey, who gave up drumming because he couldn't sing and play at 180 beats per minute. Then Tommy Ramone went from manager to drummer because he kept having to show Joey's replacements how to play the songs anyway. If you cast non-musicians and capture the real feel (particularly the exhilaration) of getting tighter over months and years of rehearsal and live performance, you can't go wrong.

4. Mix it as loud as possible. Remember that scene in Rock 'n' Roll High School where the mouse explodes when the Ramones are cranked? Loud like that. I would hope this goes without saying.

5. Skip the montages. Every biopic (hell, every contemporary American movie) makes the mistake of depicting the passage of time through a succession of montages. Here, we would probably get the mushrooming crowds and fans following the band's first CBGB show in 1974: Look, they're writing songs! Look, the kids are dressing like them! Look, their first Village Voice write-up! Look, Dee Dee is shooting up! The second act must be on its way! Noooo, thank you. Just introduce the boys, slip in a few time/date intertitles here and there, and avoid the whole tired cliché. Original punks deserve original measures, no?