Zooey Deschanel Is “With the Band”

"(500) Days of Summer" star Zooey Deschanel has signed on to play the ultimate groupie in a half-hour pilot for HBO.

"I’m With the Band: Confessions of a Groupie," the notorious memoir written by Pamela Des Barres, is to be turned into a dramedy, with Deschanel both starring and producing, according to Deadline Hollywood.

With Deschanel having played a minor supporting role in "Almost Famous," and her Janis Joplin biopic currently DOA, this seems like a weird consolation prize.

Des Barres is best known for sleeping with every rock star she could get in her sights, claiming to have bedded everyone from Mick Jagger to Don Johnson. Could this make for weekly entertainment? Absolutely, but why Deschanel?

Deschanel released a reasonably good album with M. Ward in 2008 under the name She & Him. She's got legitimate singing chops, while Des Barres' band, The GTOs, were decidedly unmusical. They were a collection of groupies Frank Zappa threw on stage before his shows to do half-assed performance/spoken word crap for a brief time.

None of this is to suggest that "Confessions" won't make for entertaining viewing. On the contrary, it should be great. But why a woman with rock aspirations of her own would want to play groupie is a little confounding.

Contact Us