“Next up is possibly a Jimi Hendrix biopic — an independent film with Andre 3000 from OutKast playing Jimi Hendrix.“

Words spoken by actress Hayley Atwell in an interview with Esquire magazine for their August issue.

As Movieline notes, Andre 3000 has long been attached to star in a Jimi Hendrix project, going all the way back to 2004, as THIS EW article shows, which the Hughes brothers were supposedly to direct. I haven’t heard anything of the project in awhile, until this little nugget from Atwell. So, does this prove that Andre 3000’s Hendrix film isn’t dead, and actually might be getting closer to being a reality?

Your guess is as good as mine. Though it seems like Atwell knows something we don’t. A Google search revealed nothing new. So, we’ll just have to watch and wait.

Just like Bob Marley and Marvin Gaye, in recent years, there’ve been numerous attempts to bring Jimi Hendrix’s life-story to the theatrical screen, with such musician/actors as Lenny Kravitz and the aforementiond Andre Benjamin expressing interest in assuming the starring role of the greatest guitarist in the history of rock music. But securing rights to the man’s story has proven to be quite the challenge with Experience Hendrix, the gatekeeper to the musician’s estate, which is run by his stepsister, Janie Hendrix.

Recall my post from August 2009 on the announced attempt by Legendary Pictures, in correlation with Woodstock’s 40th anniversary, where Hendrix’s performance of The Star-Spangled Banner was a seminal moment of the original 1969 festival…

A writer had already been hired to work on the script, hoping that it would be approved for production by the Hendrix estate, which has been very protective of Jimi’s story – and rightfully so.

And then, in December of 2009, we reported on another Hendrix movie being in the proverbial pipeline, titled Slide, and described as “a fictionalized account of what happened during Hendrix’s ‘lost weekend’.“

The legendary story goes, in brief… in September 1969, Hendrix was the subject of a hoax kidnapping, orchestrated by his manager.

However, in the fictionalized Slide, the story will revolve around two gangsters, desperately trying to get away from a mob boss they double-crossed, who inadvertently kidnap Hendrix, then at the height of his career and drug addiction. Along the way, Hendrix ends up teaching one of the gangsters about honesty, and Hendrix learns to clean up his act.

Will this be a comedy, drama, thriller…?? “Quirky” was the word used to describe it.

Producer Carol Lewis is likening the project to Peter Bogdanovich’s The Cat’s Meow, a 2001 dramedy film I haven’t seen, calling it more of a road movie than a biopic. Apparently, none of Hendrix’s music will be used, nor will any of his family be featured, and so, obtaining rights from the Hendrix estate won’t be an issue.

I haven’t heard anything about either project since initial announcements were made 2 years ago.

Stay tuned… in the meantime, check out this hip-hop unauthorized bio of Hendrix: