Could we finally have our director for the long-gestating historical epic Cleopatra? A passion project for Angelina Jolie, who would star in the lead role, the film has gone through the hands of top Hollywood directors such as James Cameron, David Fincher and Paul Greengrass, but last fall another worthy contender entered the ring with Ang Lee.
While it was simply a rumor then, the Life of Pi director himself finally opened up about the project to THR. “I’m about to read the script,” Lee said at the Palm Springs International Film Festival Gala. “It just feels right to me after all the other types of films I’ve done. What does it have in common with any of them? They’re all totally different! That’s what makes this perfect.” Indeed, Lee has always showed diversity with his directorial choices and proved he can handle an epic scale with his latest film, so here’s hoping his script read goes well.
As previously reported, Brian Helgeland wrote the first draft from Stacy Schiff‘s Cleopatra: A Life novel, with Eric Roth stepping in for a rewrite. Check out producer Scott Rudin’s previous comments on the project below, as we wait to see if Ang Lee’s likes the script and this film finally moves forward.
“It is a completely revisionist Cleopatra, a much more grown-up sophisticated version. She’s not a sex kitten, she’s a politician, strategist, warrior. In the Joseph Mankiewicz movie, Elizabeth Taylor is a seductress, but the histories of Cleopatra have been written by men. This is the first to be written by a woman. It felt like such a blow-the-doors-off-the-hinges idea of how to tell it, impossible to resist.”
Who do you think should helm Cleopatra?