trouble boys

Replacements memoir 'Trouble Boys' being adapted into biopic by 'New Mutants' director

The story of The Replacements is being turned into a biopic by Josh Boone, the writer/director of new Marvel movie The New Mutants and the upcoming Stephen King The Stand miniseries.

Yes, it does sound like a weird combo. The New Mutants sat on the shelf for over a year and finally opened in August to terrible reviews, but Boone is clearly a big fan of the band, and his source material — Bob Mehr’s fantastic 2016 biography, Trouble Boys — couldn’t be more solid.  “When we were shooting The New Mutants, I started working on, with [co-writer] Knate, we started working on an adaptation,” he told GamesRadar.

Boone tells GamesRadar he’s also got some of the film cast. “So Nat Wolff is going to play Paul Westerberg. Nat’s been in just about everything I’ve done. He was in The Stand. He starred in my first movie. He was in The Fault in Our Stars. He’s one of the best actors on the planet. Owen Teague, who is in The Stand, is going to play Tommy Stinson in it – really in the second half of it, because in the first half, Tommy Stinson is like a 12-year-old.”

“We’ve got all the scripts done for that,” Boone adds, “so I’m literally casting that right now. I’m going to go make that.” We can (hardly) wait for this one, but perhaps there is potential. With Paul and Tommy cast, who would you want to play Bob Stinson and Chris Mars? Slim Dunlap?

Before that, The Replacements are releasing a deluxe edition of 1987’s Pleased to Meet Me with 29 previously unreleased tracks. You can check out the demo of “I.O.U.” below.

Meanwhile, Boone’s miniseries adaptation of The Stand will air on CBS All Access in December and stars Whoopi Goldberg, Alexander Skarsgård, James Marsden, Odessa Young, Jovan Adepo and more. You can watch the first-look trailer below.