Watching the upcoming Tiger King TV drama probably won't be as much fun as casting it has been. In this strange period of international lockdown, Netflix provided a brief reprieve from the madness with a hefty dose of insanity from the colorful world of Joe Exotic. Following the life of Joe and his associates in the U.S. exotic animal business, the Tiger King documentary provided an unbelievable insight into the shady dealings and intense rivalries that dominate the industry, ending with Joe in jail for a plot to kill fellow zoo owner and social media personality, Carole Baskin. In under 10 episodes, Tiger King managed to cover a severed arm, a botched political campaign, a suspicious fire and a testicular-themed eulogy.
With a winning formula of crime and animals, Tiger King has been a hot topic of discussion over the past month. Aside from the fate of Carole Baskin's husband and the possibility that Joe was set up by his business rival, one major talking point has been fan-casting the various larger-than-life characters of Tiger King's world. Fans have picked their favorites, the documentary's subjects have made their selections, and actors have willingly thrown their hats into the ring, including Ed Norton and Stephen Merchant. While there are several fictionalizations of the Joe Exotic story in the pipeline, the most prominent is a scripted drama series from American Vandal's Dan Lagana, which recently cast Nicholas Cage in the coveted, mulleted lead role.
Fan-casting the likes of Exotic and Baskin has been a fun, much needed distraction in these strange times, while also adding to Tiger King's social allure. But the amusement of casting a movie or TV series doesn't necessarily mean a scripted Tiger King drama should happen. The story of Joe Exotic is undoubtedly a fascinating one, but the whole emphasis behind the Netflix docuseries is how Tiger King is stranger than fiction. The characters in the series and the things that happen to them are so unfathomable, so outlandish and so dark that they couldn't possibly be made up (just cleverly edited, according to some). The real-life aspect is very much responsible for the immense success Tiger King is currently enjoying, and trying to recreate the madcap narrative of the documentary seems futile, or at the very least unnecessary.
A scripted Tiger King TV series first faces the tricky dilemma of nailing down a story. Does Nicholas Cage's Joe Exotic stick broadly to the same chronology as the documentary, fictionalizing events viewers are already familiar with? Or does it take those facts as a basis and spin off into entirely fictional territory, putting Exotic into new, dramatized situations? Neither prospect feels like a winning formula. The world has already witnessed the events documented in Netflix's Tiger King - what more can a fictionalized version add to that? Lagana's drama would need to somehow convince Tiger King fans that his take on the story offers something the actual documentary did not. On the other hand, it would surely be a hopeless task to write a new, fictional adventure for Cage's Exotic. Not only would the series be under immense scrutiny due to the popularity of the original, but what made-up Joe Exotic mishap could possibly entertain and confound as much as his real life exploits?
Undeniably, there is a hunger for more Tiger King. Discussions are ongoing over a potential sequel documentary, either exploring Joe's life in (and maybe out) of prison, or diving into a completely new character such as Doc Antle. Meanwhile, Netflix proved their willing to milk the Joe Exotic cash cow by putting out a mostly unremarkable follow-up episode that Joel McHale bravely tried to hold together. Some have even suggested that Tiger King is a product of its time, and without the current lockdown delaying countless movie and TV productions, Tiger King wouldn't have attained such vast popularity. Tiger King captured lightning in a bottle, and getting lightning to strike twice will be tricky enough if Netflix do make a sequel documentary. But trying to distill the real-world madness and cultural meme status of Tiger King into a TV script? Joe's political career had brighter prospects.