After Sacha Baron Cohen attempted to get it made for many years, it looks like a Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody is finally moving forward with a different star. While Ben Whishaw also circled it briefly, the role of the late Queen frontman is now attached to the Emmy-winning Mr. Robot star Rami Malek. According to Deadline, Bryan Singer is attached to direct the film, which is now being scripted by The Theory of Everything writer Anthony McCarten. With a shoot eyed to begin early next year, as much we’d like to see the director step away from X-Men territory, hopefully this one doesn’t turn out to be as by-the-numbers as McCarten’s previous work.
While Dan Stevens recently got set to lead the latest thriller from The Raid director Gareth Evans, he also has found time to lead a period drama. He’s set to star in The Man Who Invented Christmas, new drama which follows the true story of a down-and-out Charles Dickens who writes A Christmas Carol to help support is family. Also starring Christopher Plummer as Scrooge, and Jonathan Pryce as Dickens’ father, Bharat Nalluri (Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day) will direct the Susan Coyne-scripted adaptation based of Les Standiford’s book. Bleecker Street has picked it up for a late 2017 release, according to Deadline, following a shoot that begins next month.
If you are still reeling from the monumental disappointment that was The Hobbit trilogy, perhaps another J.R.R. Tolkien film will make up for it. Rather than entering a fantastical world, Deadline reports this biographical drama will follow the iconic author’s life as he went from a happy life in Oxford to four years of war. Coming from director James Strong (Doctor Who, 11.22.63) the film is titled Middle Earth and is based on a script by Angus Fletcher, who spent six years researching the life of Tolkien and talking to his friends and family.
Lastly, but perhaps most intriguingly, Tobias Lindholm (A War, A Hijacking) is set to direct his English-language debt with The Good Nurse. Set up at Lionsgate, Deadline reports that the Darren Aronofsky-produced thriller will be based on Charles Graeber‘s book as adapted by Krysty Wilson-Cairns (Penny Dreadful). The film will follow the true story of Charlie Cullen, a nurse who lived a double life as a serial killer of over 300 people in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, making his the most prolific in the latter state of perhaps American history. As we await Martin Scorsese’s The Devil in the White City to get off the ground, this sounds like the ideal prerequisite.