The Artist: Marvin Gaye
The Actor: Lenny Kravitz
Journey to the Big Screen: A post-Hunger Games Kravitz has just signed on to play the soul legend, in his first starring role. Brit Julien Temple — better known for punk-focused cult films like The Filth and the Fury and Absolute Beginners — will direct.
Production Status: The as-yet-untitled movie is slated to start filming next year and will focus on Gaye's final years in Europe, including his famous struggles with addiction and his death in 1984 at age 44, at the hands of his own father.
The Artist: Jimi Hendrix
The Actor: Andre Benjamin
Journey to the Big Screen: The Hendrix estate refused the rights to his catalog, so Benjamin — a.k.a. Andre 3000, one half of the beloved, long-on-hiatus rap duo OutKast — covers songs by the likes of the Beatles and Muddy Waters instead.
Production Status: All Is by My Side is in post-production, though paparazzi shots leaked from the set in Ireland over the summer (Side covers the guitarist's time in London in 1966 and '67) gave fans a peek at Benjamin's wild-haired, velvet-pantsed transformation.
The Artist: Jeff Buckley
The Actor: Penn Badgley
Journey to the Big Screen: Gossip Girl's Badgley portrays the ''Hallelujah'' singer in Greetings From Tim Buckley, which tells the story of the days leading up to a 1991 tribute-concert performance for the late troubadour's own father — '60s folkie Tim, who also died tragically young.
Production Status: The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. (A different Buckley biopic set to star Reeve Carney, Mystery White Boy, appears to be in limbo, with unconfirmed reports that Amy Berg has replaced director Jake Scott.)
The Artist: Nina Simone
The Actor: Zoë Saldana
Journey to the Big Screen: Original star Mary J. Blige dropped out of Nina, which toggles between the jazz diva's later years and flashbacks to her youth. Critics, including Simone's daughter, have already lambasted Saldana's lighter skin tone and the project's prosthetics.
Production Status: Now in postproduction. The 27-day shoot in Southern California wrapped just before Thanksgiving.
The Artist: Liberace
The Actor: Michael Douglas
Journey to the Big Screen: Helmed by Steven Soderbergh, Behind the Candelabra — delayed after Douglas was diagnosed with cancer in 2010 — recounts the life (and many wigs and capes) of the Vegas showman. Matt Damon costars as Liberace's much-younger lover.
Production Status: Candelabra, now in postproduction, is slated to light up HBO in the first half of 2013. It's also the last film scored by award-winning composer Marvin Hamlisch before his death in August.
The Artist: Janis Joplin
The Actor: Nina Arianda
Journey to the Big Screen: Everyone from Renée Zellweger to Zooey Deschanel has been set to play Joplin in one of the longest-gestating biopics ever. Broadway breakout Arianda (Venus in Fur) won the final prize — and the film has exclusive rights to dozens of Joplin's songs.
Production Status: Janis, set to start shooting this summer with director Sean Durkin (Martha Marcy May Marlene), will follow the singer in the last six months of her tempestuous life. Lee Daniels is in talks to direct another Joplin biopic, with Amy Adams in the title role.
