Liz Phair nearly played Lisa Bonet’s role in High Fidelity

This week, the folks over at Consequence of Sound posted an extraordinary oral history on the making of High Fidelity, in celebration of its 20th anniversary. The in-depth piece featured interviews with Nick Hornby, director Stephen Frears, screenwriters DV DeVincentis, John Cusack, central cast members like Steve Pinke Jack Black, Todd Louiso, and Iben Hjejle and many more.

The piece is totally brilliant, and a must-read for any High Fidelity tragic. One takeaway that rattled us to our core was the revelation that Liz Phair was almost cast as Marie De Salle.

“I remember that we initially focused on the possibility of finding a real singer to do the role of Marie. Like a musician. I was really pushing for Liz Phair because she and I were old friends from North Chicago,” revealed screenwriter DV DeVincentis. “And I thought Liz would kill it. She became one of the more important musicians to come out of Chicago in the ’90s. So, we actually had a read-through of the script in Chicago with Liz reading the role. We did it at Joanie Cusack’s house. And she was totally great. And we’re like, ‘She’s an actress. Oh my God.’”

Ultimately the role ended up going to Lisa Bonet because the screenwriters “wanted her to be mystifying.”

“In the book [Marie] was like this American singer-songwriter. So, we were trying to think about, ‘Who would be outside of Rob’s reference level?’ Because we wanted her to be mystifying,” Steve Pink elaborated.

“If it was Jewel or someone like that, that wouldn’t be odd to a white dude in Chicago. So, we wanted to find someone who could play it with this mysterious quality that he could be awed by, who was also in the music world. And I don’t remember how [Bonet’s] name came up, but I remember thinking it was brilliant.”

Although I would lay down my life for Liz Phair, it’s hard to imagine anyone embodying the role of Marie De Salle with the finesse that Lisa Bonet did. There’s also something so satisfying about Bonet’s daughter, Zoë Kravitz, undertaking the lead role in the High Fidelity Hulu series.