Hollywood Heartthrobs, Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans are set to star in Netflix’s new spy thriller adaption of the novel, The Gray Man. As if things couldn’t get any more exciting, the movie will be helmed by the brains behind Avengers Endgame, writer-director duo, Russo Brothers.
Evans and Gosling are partnering up for the first time with the intention “to create a new franchise. With a James Bond-level of scale and a budget upward of $200 million.” The Gray Man will be Netflix’s most financially ambitious movie to date.
The film reunites the Russo brothers with Evans, who stars as Captain America in the Avengers franchise. Shortly after the news broke, Evans took to Twitter to voice his thoughts. “Been excited about this one for a while! Round 5 with @Russo_Brothers.”
The Dream Team
The film will be produced by Russo Brothers’ production company, AGBO, along with Joe Roth, Mike Larocca and Jeff Kirschenbaum. Script, which is penned by Joe Russo, will be polished by Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame writers, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely.
The team is eyeing a January start date in Los Angeles while international locations are being finalized.
Possible Franchise?
Based on the Mark Greaney novel of the same name, The Gray Man centers on a freelance assassin and former CIA operative turned killer, Court Gentry. Who will be played by Ryan Gosling. Gentry is hunted across the globe by his former CIA colleague, now nemesis, Lloyd Hansen, Evans.
The Russos believe that this Bourne-like story, which turned into a bestselling book series. Has the potential to inspire several follow-ups with Gosling’s character at the center. This isn’t the first you’ve heard of this project. The idea was developed years back at New Regency as a Brad Pitt/James Gray vehicle, but it stalled. The Russos have since been quietly developing it for years.
“Moving into a more real-world setting”
Anthony Russo recently spoke about the movie in an interview with Deadline. “The movie is a real mano. A mano between those two great actors who represent two different versions of the CIA. In what it can be, and what it can do. Russo even called out to the popular Marvel franchise fans.
“For those who were fans of Captain America: Winter Soldier, this is us moving into that territory in more of a real-world setting. That’s what this movie really means for us.”
“We think Netflix is the perfect place for this film”
Joe Russo went on to further elaborate on the film’s scale: “The intention is for it to be competitive with any theatrical. And the ability to do it with Gosling and Evans is a dream for us.
The idea is to create a franchise and build out a whole universe, with Ryan at the center of it. We have all committed to the first movie, and that’s got to be great to get us to the second movie. These are master assassins, and Gosling’s characters gets burned by the CIA. Evans’ character has to hunt him down. We have a great working relationship with Netflix. And we go back almost 20 years with Scott Stuber. We formed AGBO to be an agnostic storytelling company, where we figure out the best platform. We think Netflix is the perfect place for this film.”
Recent Successes
Aside from the infamous Avengers box office record, AGBO also produced the action film, Extraction. Starring, Chris Hemsworth, Golshifteh Farahani and Randeep Hooda. Extraction was very well received by fans and has gone on to become the most watched Netflix original movie of all time.
Upcoming Projects: Tom Holland, Richard Madden, Priyanka Chopra…
Joe and Anthony are in post-production on the Tom Holland-led film Cherry, a crime drama based on Nico Walker’s novel of the same name. The indie drama narrates the true story of a PTSD-suffering man (Holland) who self-medicates and robs banks in Cleveland.
AGBO has also reportedly secured a deal at Amazon Studios for Citadel, a global thriller series that will star Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra. Amazon has revealed that the franchise will have a local-language production originating from Mexico, as well as additional versions in Italy and India.
According to reports, The Russo Brothers are also working on a live-action version of Hercules at Disney. And another Novel adaptation, Exit West with Netflix and Michelle and Barack Obama’s Higher Ground Productions.
Also Read : News Highlights From July 2020
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