Years of Refusal: Morrissey Biopic to Focus on Singer’s Early Life

Production on a film about the life of former Smiths singer Morrissey, titled Steven, has begun. It will focus on the singer as a young man in the years before he met his Smiths foil, Johnny Marr. Director Mark Gill, who made the Oscar-nominated short The Voorman Problem, is helming the project and one of the film’s producers, as well as its casting director, previously worked on the Ian Curtis and Joy Division biopic Control. Principal photography will tentatively begin in the U.K. in late 2014.

Reality Bites: The 25 Best and Worst Biopics

“The film covers Morrissey‘s life pre-Smiths and is more of a portrait than a conventional biopic,” Gill said in a statement. “It’s as much a film for non-Morrissey fans as it is for die-hard devotees, but I can’t deny that this is a love letter to Steven Patrick Morrissey and the dark satanic mills of Manchester.”

Miles away from Manchester’s dark satanic mills, Morrissey recently launched a U.S. tour in San Jose, California. He played a career-spanning set, stretching from his early works with the Smiths to songs that will be featured on his upcoming LP, World Peace Is None of Your Business. The fans at the show were so excited by Morrissey’s performance that they jumped onstage and caused a pile-up on the vocalist as he was singing the night’s final number, “One Day Goodbye Will Be Farewell.”

Here is video of the onstage melee: