Disney may have shut down The Lone Ranger, but it’s still busy on other projects, and one of those is a live action version of the Cinderella story. For decades Disney felt they had an almost proprietary ownership over fairy tale movies, but they’ve been rather caught on the back foot as other studios have jumped in with rival Snow White movies and suchlike.
Since then Disney have struck back with filming starting on Sam Raimi’s Wizard Of Oz prequel, while they have their own Snow White tale in the works and also Cinderella.
Now Deadline reports that they are trying to nail down Mark Romanek (One Hour Photo; Bee Season) to direct the movie. There’s no details on whether Romanek might be interested, but the studio wants him. Apparently this version of Cinderella will try to follow Alice in Wonderland (which helped kick off Hollywood’s fairy tale obsession) in style, complete with an all-star cast, although no casting announcements have been made as of yet.
Aline Brosh McKenna, who wrote the hit drama The Devil Wears Prada, wrote the pitch for the film that Disney picked up. It’s said to update the classic story – at least in terms of making the title character less passive – with a prince locked in a politically prearranged marriage that goes off the rails once he falls for the Pumpkin driving Cinderella, complete with the horrible step sisters, the glass slipper, and all.
It isn’t certain whether Romanek will sign on, but Disney hopes he will.