Movies

The Bodyguard remake will star 'young Latina' in Whitney Houston's role

"It was important to me to use this opportunity to get Latin faces up on that screen and to get their stories told in a big way," says the film's writer, Matthew López.

By

Sydney Bucksbaum

Published on September 29, 2021 07:04PM EDT

Get ready for a new version of The Bodyguard.

The iconic 1992 movie starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner is being updated with a remake written by Matthew López, who became the first Latino playwright to win a Tony Award for Best Play, for his epic work The Inheritance, after Sunday's ceremony. López recently revealed that his new script for The Bodyguard will center on a "young Latina" character in the lead role.

"When Warner Bros. approached me about the idea, I quickly said I would but I wanted the protagonist to be Latina," he said in an interview with Variety. "They agreed to that. There's been a lot of speculation about what I'd bring to the remake, and some people were assuming that there'd be a gay storyline to it." (López is gay, and The Inheritance traces the lives of a group of gay men.)

He continued, "Instead of focusing on an established star like the one Whitney Houston played, this is about a young Latina performer who has just become famous... It was important to me to use this opportunity to get Latin faces up on that screen and to get their stories told in a big way."

López went on to reveal some more changes he's bringing to the story. "It's about how her life has changed because she is an overnight sensation. In the 21st century, that means she's in immediate need of protection."

The original film starred iconic singer Houston as Rachel Marron, an Oscar-nominated actress who hires a bodyguard (Costner) to protect her after receiving threatening messages from a stalker. Costner dropped a bomb about the original movie's poster in a recent interview with EW.

"That wasn't even Whitney actually," Costner told EW. "She had gone home and that was her double, and her head was buried into my shoulder, which was appropriate anyway. She was frightened."

The remake of The Bodyguard does not yet have a release date.

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The Bodyguard remake will star 'young Latina' in Whitney Houston's role

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