Naomi Watts has joined the cast of Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar in which she is set to play Helen Gandy, the personal secretary of J. Edgar Hoover of fifty-four years. She joins a stellar cast led by Leonardo DiCaprio as the infamous FBI founder/director. Charlize Theron was originally set to play the part, but backed out due to scheduling difficulties.
Here’s the fun part. You may not think playing a secretary in a government office is a great role, but Gandy was apparently a big deal. She was with Hoover for fifty-four years and had an unnaturally tight hold on the behind-the-scenes dealings of the institution. Which proves Mad Men to be more factual than we thought. The craziest thing about Gandy is that following Hoover’s death, she took it upon herself to destroy Hoover’s “personal” files that supposedly held a lot of incriminating evidence. Loyal, much? It’s an intriguing part of American history and it’ll be interesting to see how Eastwood handles it.
As for the rest of the cast, I’ll let Deadline block quote for me:
Ed Westwick is set to play Agent Smith, a clean-cut operative hired by Hoover to write his biography; Josh Lucas plays aviator Charles Lindbergh; Damon Herriman plays Bruno Hauptmann, the German immigrant accused of kidnapping Lindbergh’s 20-month baby in 1932. Called the crime of the century, Hauptmann’s trial was a major case for Hoover; Ken Howard is playing U.S. attorney General Harlan F. Stone and Armie Hammer is set to play Clyde Tolson, Hoover’s alleged lover.
Source: Deadline
