Avengers star Jeremy Renner wants to race, on film at least, as Variety reports that he has set up the true-life racecar drama, Slingshot, at Paramount, which he will star in and produce. Goodness knows how the actor thinks he’s gonna find time to film it, as he’s already got enough projects lined up that he could keep going til he’s on his deathbed, but nevertheless it’s being developed with Renner in the driving seat.
The story of Slingshot follows the real-life adventures of racecar driver Bill Caswell, who bought a BMW off of Craigslist for $500 and used it to win the World Rally Championships held in Mexico. Don Handfield will produce, alongside Jeremy Renner, as well as pen the screenplay, for their newly minted production banner The Combine. The pair are also working on a Steve McQueen biopic, although it isn’t known is that or Slingshot will happen first (and apparently neither do they at this stage).
Jeremy Renner adds Slingshot to a heavy roster of projects, which include the recently wrapped Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, the now-in production superhero ensemble The Avengers, where he plays archer Hawkeye, and the lead in The Bourne Legacy, which starts shooting as soon as The Avengers is wrapped. He will also be seen in Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol, which hits cinemas this Christmas. Renner is certainly doing well for a man who was praised for The Hurt Locker, but is yet to prove himself as a mainstream leading man. Hollywood seems to have decided he’s a sure-thing for super-stardom, and hopefully they’ll be right, but at the moment it’s a lot of trust in a man for whom there’s no guaranteed audience (but it worked for Sam Worthington, so why not here?).