We first learned about the details of Coward — a potential follow-up to Ceremony for writer-director Max Winkler — in June of last year, though the status of the project was so uncertain, we weren’t even sure if it would be Winkler’s next project. (Apparently, he’s also attached to a mob-comedy starring Steve Carell and Jake Johnson.) However, the prospects for Coward have taken a huge leap forward recently, as Deadline is reporting that Adam Driver — the fast-rising star of Girls, among about a dozen other things — has signed on to play the film’s lead character.
Based on a play by Nick Jones — which was produced for Lincoln Center’s LCT3 during the 2010-2011 season — Coward has been described as “a match between Barry Lyndon and Trading Places.” The adapted screenplay, meanwhile, has been co-written by Winkler and Matt Spicer (who will also produce). Set in 18th century England, “Driver [will play] Lucidus, a nobleman who hails from a family with a track record of men who came out on the losing end of to-the-death duels. When Lucidus is challenged to trade pistol shots, he panics and hires a common criminal to take his place in the duel. Trouble is, that criminal decides the life of a nobleman is a step up and he steals his employer’s identity.”
Driver is said to have selected this part “over several other offers,” which actually says quite a bit when you consider the caliber of the films he’s been in recently. In addition to his ubiquitous work on Lena Dunham‘s HBO series, he had a bit-part in Steven Spielberg‘s Lincoln as the awe-struck recipient of Daniel Day-Lewis‘s speech on Euclid’s first common notion. He’ll also appear in a promising handful of upcoming projects, including Joel and Ethan Coen‘s Inside Llewyn Davis, Noah Baumbach‘s Frances Ha, Michael Dowse‘s The F Word, and Stone director John Curran‘s Tracks.
How do you think Driver will fare in his first leading screen performance?