Beyond the Sea (film) portray Bobby Darin, but the filmmakers believed the actor was too old. Around this time, Spacey coincidentally performed the cover version of Darin's "That Old Black Magic" for the soundtrack of "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil". The actor explained that after 1994, "at least three times a year, my manager would call over to Warner Bros. and say, 'Hey, what's happening with that Bobby Darin movie? You guys ever going to make it?'" With filming to originally begin in late 1997, pre-production for "Dreamer" was commencing, and Levinson began to discuss the film with various actors. This
Beyond the Sea (film) came from foreign production companies, Spacey performed six songs at the November 2003 American Film Market. Lions Gate Entertainment quickly picked up the distribution duties and Spacey found enough investors from England and Germany to continue to move forward on production. In addition, Spacey declined to be paid for his work as actor, director, co-writer and producer on "Beyond the Sea". A portion of the $25 million budget came from his own Trigger Street Productions. Producer Arthur Friedman, who had shepherded the biopic since 1987, commented that he and Spacey experienced creative differences during pre-production. Friedman remarked that he was