With shooting on the eight-film, ten-year-spanning “Harry Potter” series finally wrapping a couple of weeks ago, the franchise’s star Daniel Radcliffe is left without a regular gig, and only his millions and millions of dollars to comfort him. The actor is set to topline a Broadway revival of the excellent musical “How To Succeed Without Really Trying” for director Rob Ashford next year, but he’s now lined up a project for after that.
Radcliffe will star in a new version of the classic Erich Maria Remarque novel “All Quiet on the Western Front,” which follows a group of German soldiers during the First World War, and which was mostly famously adapted in 1930 to Best Picture-winning success. It was also remade for TV in 1979, starring John-Boy from “The Waltons” and Ernest Borgnine, although that version is strangely less fondly remembered…
The project will mark a return to the trenches for Radcliffe, who starred in the WW1 TV drama “My Boy Jack” in 2007 alongside Kim Cattrall and Carey Mulligan. The actor is still untested outside the “Harry Potter” franchise, his sole excursion to date, the Australian drama “December Boys” sinking without a trace. But between this and his long-time attachment to play young British photojournalist Dan Eldon — who was killed in Somalia in 1993 — in the drama “The Journey Is The Destination,” it suggests he’s at least got a high-minded taste in possible future projects. “All Quiet On The Western Front” is set to go before cameras in 2012, with a 2013 release likely. [Variety]