Can Hollywood stop waiting for Brad Pitt? The actor has had two projects announced so far this week. Luckily he’ll only be acting in one of them. Scheduling would be tricky either way, since in-demand Pitt and partner Angelina Jolie don’t work simultaneously. Jolie has Salt 2, Maleficent and Cleopatra in the pipelines, while Pitt is currently filming Marc Forster’s World War Z. Pitt is now in talks to star in The Gray Man, based on Adam Cozad’s script (on 2010 Black List), which is an adaptation of Mark Greaney’s novel. James Gray (the man behind Joaquin Phoenix starrers We Own the Night and Two Lovers) will direct for New Regency (which was behind Pitt’s Fight Club and Mr. and Mrs. Smith). Pitt would play a burned assassin on the run.
Pitt’s production house, Plan B (also producing World War Z), are planning an adaptation of Solomon Northup’s 1853 autobiography, Twelve Years a Slave. Chiwetel Ejiofor will star as the free black who was lured to Washington, D.C. from New York by two men with talk of a job. Upon his arrival, Northup was kidnapped and brutally enslaved for years until a white Canadian man helped him smuggle letters to his wife, leading to a court case in which he regained his freedom. Hunger and Shame director Steve McQueen will direct. We are officially excited.
The upside of Pitt and Jolie taking turns? They are forced to be selective, which hopefully means quality over quantity (let’s leave The Tourist out of this.) Which of their projects do you want to see first?
[Images courtesy of Wire Image, Mr. and Mrs. Smith]
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