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Ben Platt and Beanie Feldstein’s New Movie Will Roll Out in 20 Years

The queer actors have been cast in Richard Linklater's "Merrily We Roll Along."

They've got a good thing going—for at least two decades.

Buddies Ben Platt and Beanie Feldstein will star in Richard Linklater's film adaptation of Merrily We Roll Along, Stephen Sondheim's 1981 Broadway musical about the estrangement of three showbiz friends over the course of 20 years, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Based on George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart's 1934 play of the same name, the beloved musical unfolds backwards, culminating with the characters in their 20s and just embarking on their careers.

Glee alum Blake Jenner will star as Franklin Shepard, a talented Broadway composer who sells out to become a Hollywood producer. Feldstein will play Shepard's best friend, theater critic Mary Flynn. Platt, a Tony winner for his performance in Dear Evan Hansen, will play Charley Kringas, Shepard's frustrated songwriting partner.

Instead of using makeup or special effects to age the characters, Linklater, 59, will shoot the movie musical in reverse chronological order over the next 20 years. Don't ruin this for us, global warming!

Linklater's Oscar-nominated 2014 film Boyhood was similarly filmed over the course of 12 years.

“I first saw and fell in love with Merrily in the ’80s, and I can’t think of a better place to spend the next 20 years than in the world of a Sondheim musical," says the filmmaker in a statement. "I don’t enter this multiyear experience lightly, but it seems the best, perhaps the only way, to do this story justice on film.”

Principal photography has already been completed for the first segment of Merrily We Roll Along.

Platt and Feldstein, both queer actors, are also muses of Ryan Murphy. Platt headlines Murphy's new series The Politician, which premieres September 27 on Netflix. Feldstein will play Monica Lewinsky in Impeachment, the third installment of Murphy's Emmy-winning American Crime Story franchise, out next fall.

Jenner, who starred in Linklater's Everybody Wants Some!!, was last seen in the Netflix series What/If.

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