Casting this year’s Southern 500 occurred to me a couple weeks ago, because I’ll be damned if that playoff cutoff race at Darlington Raceway wasn’t one of the most dramatic — and cinematic — races in quite some time.
As such, it got me thinking about who I’d cast in the roles of the main players in the race if a movie got made about it. This is all very free-form and stream-of-consciousness as I thought through actors, and I’m taking some creative liberties, so I can guarantee there’s some candidates I missed. I’ll go in order of the top 10 and tack on any other major players in the race at the end.
Eventual winner Chase Briscoe was probably the toughest to find similarities to. Ryan Guzman? Eh. Joaquin Phoenix? Little older than needed. I settled on Jake Gyllenhaal.
In the past 10 years or so, Gyllenhaal has taken on roles where it’s clear he’s just having a blast. He’s wonderfully psychotic in Nightcrawler (should’ve been nominated for and won an Oscar for that, by the way), and he’s bonkers in Ambulance, so who’s to say he can’t play a lifelong Tony Stewart fan who got to drive for his hero?
Runner-up Kyle Busch? Matt Damon. Gotta be an older actor, even if it’s older than Busch actually is, and Damon brings the pedigree. Plus, he already has a racing role under his belt thanks to Ford v Ferrari.
Rounding out the podium, I’ll cast Mike Faist as Christopher Bell. Faist probably narrowly missed out on an Oscar nomination for Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story back in the 2021-22 awards season and is an excellent (and underrated) actor. He has a sports movie in his repertoire already with Challengers earlier this year.
Kyle Larson led more than 250 laps but ultimately came up short and finished fourth. Throw Steven Yeun out there. He’s had some great turns in stuff like Minari, Nope and Sorry to Bother You.
Cut Charlie Day’s hair a bit shorter, and…
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