Bryan Cranston Plays A Version Of Himself In The Masterpiece

Like most independent James Franco projects, The Masterpiece, a biopic based on actor/writer/director Tommy Wiseau and what happened behind the scenes of his epically atrocious passion project, The Room, is currently left in media limbo until it pops up at some film festival. It’s been nearly a year since production wrapped on the dramedy, which suggests it should hit the screen sooner rather than later, but for now, we’re left aloof.

We know that it stars a quarter of Hollywood’s finest and brightest including Seth Rogen, Dave Franco, Alison Brie, Josh Hutcherson, Sharon Stone, Zac Efron, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Hannibal Burress, James Franco himself as Wiseau, and that’s just scratching the surface. But it appears that for one very specific co-star, Bryan Cranston, the role wasn’t too much of a stretch.

Promoting the recently-released Why Him?, Cranston and Franco delved into the latter’s noteworthy dramatization during a conversation with South China Morning Post and that’s where the actor/writer/director revealed the Breaking Bad star’s role in his film. “It took eight months for the film to go ahead and I asked Bryan to play Sheriff in In Dubious Battle, and then I directed The Masterpiece and he did that too. I asked if he would play himself, and he actually plays a version of himself from the early 2000s, so it’s Bryan Cranston from Malcolm in the Middle. It just speaks to his love of cinema that he supports his fellow artists.”