Hollywood sure loves King Arthur. He’s been a perenially popular topic, sometimes with more success than other. Now Warner wants to have a go, as they have purchased the spec screenplay Arthur And Lancelot from filmmaker David Dobkin, director of Wedding Crashers and the upcoming The Change-Up.
There was a bit of a bidding war between Warner Bros., Fox, and Universal, according to Variety, which Warner won with a hefty $2 million bid, a huge amount for a spec deal in the current climate. The project is described as a modern reimagining of the King Arthur and Sir Lancelot tales.
Dobkin will also direct the movie, and seeing as he had a background in comedy, the presumption is there will be more humour in this take on the legends than we normally see. The project is budgeted at $90 million, although it isn’t known when production might start on Arthur and Lancelot.
Over the last year, numerous King Arthur movies have been mooted, including a remake of Excalibur, another film called Excalibur but not related to other film, as well as a couple others. All has been quiet on those though, so it isn’t known if they’ve been dropped or are still slowly moving forward.