"The world belongs to the weird," so says the tagline for 'Weird: The Al Yankovic Story'. The wee hours of Friday morning belonged to Daniel Radcliffe as the comedy made its world premiere when the clock struck midnight at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Radcliffe stars as the beloved parody musician in the upcoming Roku original film, which made its world premiere at the Royal Alexandra Theatre, kicking off TIFF's Midnight Madness programming lineup, reports Variety.
It was a full house at the theater and the crowd ate up every second of the parody biopic, cheering loudly for every surprise cameo (of which there were many) at the first "backstory" behind Yankovic's biggest hits from 'My Bologna' to 'Eat It'.
Some of the most raucous applause was saved for the Radcliffe-fronted rendition of 'Amish Paradise'.'Weird' is directed by Eric Appel, who co-wrote the film with Yankovic. Produced by Funny or Die and Tango, the project tells a mostly fictionalized version of how the parody artist rose to superstardom.
It also marks Appel's feature directorial debut, born from his 2010 viral video that depicted Yankovic's life story as far more scandalous than it really was, skewering the stereotypes of typical biopics.Yankovic, Appel, Radcliffe and Wood took the stage after the screening to break down everything the audience had just consumed and answer their pressing Weird Al questions.
So, how did Radcliffe learn to play Yankovic's iconic accordion?The other Midnight Madness screenings include anthology horror film 'V/H/S 99', 'The Blackening' from director Tim Story, 'The People's Joker' from Vera Drew, 'Project Wolf Hunting' by Kim Hongsun, 'Sick' by John Hyams, 'Sisu' by Jalmari Helander and 'Venus' by Jaume Balaguero, all of which will make their world premieres at the festival.
Ti West's 'X' prequel 'Pearl' makes its North American premiere in the line-up, which will close the Canadian premiere of "Lenore Will Never Die," from Filipina filmmaker Martika Ramierez Escobar.