Burton Delivers Deliverance Banjo Boy

A nice article at The New Yorker discusses Time Burton’s quest to cast Billy Redden, the banjo playing boy in Deliverance in his new film Big Fish .

Redden, who is now forty-seven, works ten-hour days as a cook and dishwasher at the nearby Cookie Jar Café, and he was hesitant at first about taking time off to appear in another film. For one thing, he had always regretted being the poster boy for “Deliverance”’s Gothic view of rural America. For another, he hadn’t enjoyed working with the film’s star, Burt Reynolds.