Since Marc Forster directed Quantum Of Solace, he’s attached himself to a lot of movie, from Angelology to World War Z, while never seeming to get any closer to actually filming any of them. Now he’s got another movie to add to his list of films he’s meant to be making – The Chancellor’s Manuscript.
Variety reports that Forster has signed up with Paramount to direct the Robert Ludlum adaptation, about an author who writes a novel in which Washington power brokers are being blackmailed into altering US policies. However when the people behind a real blackmail plot find the manuscript, they think the author knows what they’re up to and so try to hunt him down.
The screenplay is being handled by Peter O’Brien, whose script, Unlocked, made the 2008 black list of the best unproduced scripts in Hollywood. He’s taking over from numerous other people who’ve had a go at adapting the book (Paramount has had the film in the works since 2005, but it’s only now that there’s any real momentum behind it).
The Chancellor’s Manuscript is being assembled as a potential starring vehicle for Leo DiCaprio and is one of several Ludlum thrillers Hollywood is currently working on. Much of the momentum behind Tinsel Town’s current interest in the author’s novels has been generated by the success of the Bourne Trilogy. Also in the works is a film version of Ludlum’s The Sigma Protocol, while David Cronenberg is lining up The Matarese Circle, with Tom Cruise and Denzel Washington set to star.