Sacha Baron Cohen Explains Disturbing Reason He Dropped Out Of Freddie Mercury Biopic

There are amazing stories about Freddie Mercury. The guy was wild. He was living an extreme lifestyle [of] debauchery. There are stories of little people with plates of cocaine on their heads walking around a party. It [becomes] a less interesting movie, but you’ve got to remember — and I understand it — they are a band, they want to protect their legacy as a band, they want it to be about Queen. And I fully understand that. [After] my first meeting, I should never have carried on because a member of the band, I won’t say who, he said, ‘This is such a great movie because such an amazing thing happens in the middle of the movie.’ I go, ‘What happens in the middle of the movie?’ He goes, ‘Freddie dies.’ I go, ‘So you mean, it’s a bit like Pulp Fiction, the end is the middle, and the middle is the end? That’s interesting.’ He goes, ‘No no no.’ So I said, ‘Wait a minute, what happens in the second half of the movie?’ And he said, ‘Well, we see how the band carries on from strength to strength.’ And I said, ‘Listen, not one person is going to see a movie where the lead character dies from AIDS, and then you carry on to see [what happens to the band].”Sacha Baron Cohen during an interview with Howard Stern and speaking about ending his involvement with the Freddie Mercury biopic