Brad Pitt sounds elusive in these brief quotes about “Moneyball,” the statistics-heavy baseball project about Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane and his scrappy team, which fell apart earlier this year in the ugliest of manners while Steven Soderbergh was at the helm (here’s a ton of stories on the matter, but basically last minute script changes and creative differences evidently ground the film to a halt just days before it was scheduled to shoot).
Soderbergh is off the project, but Pitt, Sony, screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (who is writing a new draft) and producers Mike DeLuca are still trying to keep the film on base and presumably looking for a new director (we already provided some strong suggestions).
These questions were aimed at Pitt on a red carpet stop (a horrible, soulless place to conduct a mini, 30-second interview) so don’t expect anything too earth shattering. But he was asked if he thinks the “Moneyball” project can be salvaged and go into extra innings.
“My gut says yes,” is his response. Perhaps he didn’t want to say too much because of all the controversy and noise around the project, but he did allude to the problems and negative press it received earlier this year. “It’s a weird climate right now,” he said. “But we’re still trying to re-mount it. I hope we get to do it soon.” Not much, but we believe it’s the first time he’s addressed or talked about the project post-debacle.
BTW, that rumored Vanity Fair article that would allegedly get into the whole “Moneyball” imbroglio? We’ve heard it’s false, not happening and was never a reality. Would be a shame if that turns out to be true. We were dying to read it.