Justin Long turned 47 and celebrated the occasion by dropping a photo that had fans (and probably a few confused scroll-stoppers) doing double-takes. Bald head, wild bushy beard? He looks less like the guy from Dodgeball and more like someone who’d either write The Giving Tree or lead a cult in the desert. “47 y.o. And I’ve finally entered my Shel Silverstein phase!” he wrote on Instagram. “He was my favorite when I was a boy (and he still is!).” Naturally, speculation exploded. Wait, is Justin Long playing Shel Silverstein? Is there a biopic about the beloved author on the way?
Christina Hendricks commented, “You are playing Shel! My favorite.” Nathan Fillion, Emile Hirsch, and David Krumholtz all chimed in with love. What’s confusing is that there’s no confirmed Shel Silverstein film in the works. Not anymore, anyway. James Franco was attached to a project based on A Boy Named Shel, but it quietly disappeared into development purgatory.
IMDb, on the other hand, lists Long in Night Patrol, a Ryan Prows thriller with CM Punk and Dermot Mulroney. Could the Silverstein look just be for that? It doesn’t seem so.
Whether he’s channeling Shel Silverstein or something darker, one thing’s clear: this isn’t the Justin Long you remember. And yes, someone did mistake him for Charles Manson. Long’s horror résumé (Barbarian, Drag Me to Hell, Jeepers Creepers) suggests this could go either way.
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