The "tiger king" himself, Joe Exotic, has some ideas about which Hollywood actors he would like to portray him onscreen in a hypothetical film about his life, and his choices could not be more opposite. The currently incarcerated star of the wildly popular Netflix docu-series, Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness, spoke to the show's co-director Rebecca Chaiklin about how thrilled he is about the success of the show. While he may currently be serving 22 years in prison for ordering a hit on his nemesis, Florida tiger sanctuary-owner Carole Baskin, Joe, real name Joseph Maldonado-Passage, would love for the adaptations of his life and the big cat conservatory world to continue. In fact, Chaiklin told The Hollywood Reporter that Joe knows exactly who should portray him onscreen—well, not exactly, considering he doesn't seem to know the real name of one of these actors.
“[Joe] would like Brad Pitt or David Spade to play him," Chaiklin revealed; however, "he doesn’t refer to David Spade as David Spade." Instead, Joe knows Spade best as one of his most famous fictional characters who bears the same first name as the "tiger king": Joe Dirt from Spade's 2001 film of the same name.
While plenty of fellow actors, such as Edward Norton and Dax Shepard, have expressed interest in taking on the role of Joe Exotic in a potential film adaptation of the docu-series, Spade and Pitt are Joe's top picks.
Spade even spoke to one of the Netflix series' stars, Saff Saffery, about who should play Joe, and Saff was definitely in favour of Spade taking on the role.
Do you see David Spade playing Joe Exotic? Or is there somebody even more fitting for the role?