As Terry Gilliam‘s long developing “The Man Who Killed Don Quixote” hit yet another delay recently, it looks like he’ll shortly have some major league competition in telling the story of the man of La Mancha. But the director doesn’t have to worry about anybody stepping on his toes.
Disney is now developing their own “Don Quixote” movie that will apparently be in the spirit of their “Pirates Of The Caribbean” franchise, essentially meaning, more swashbuckling adventure. Billy Ray (“The Hunger Games,” “Captain Phillips“) will be writing the script that will be inspired by the book by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, and I would imagine will only very loosely follow that narrative.
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So, while the easy quip would be that Gilliam should be worried, perhaps it’s Johnny Depp who needs to be sent a memo. Quite a few years ago, the actor set up his own brewing “Don Quixote” project at Disney, one that he was producing via his Infinitum Nihil company, with Steve Pink (“Hot Tub Time Machine“) and Jeff Morris (“True Memoirs Of An International Assassin“) writing the script. At the time, Depp was only producing, but it’s not hard to imagine that he was also looking at it as yet another blockbuster vehicle for him (and don’t forget, he was the original star of Gilliam’s first, and tragically aborted attempt to make his ‘Don Quixote’ movie).
I’m guessing that Disney has cooled on Depp as a reliable box office star, not just because of his recent legal woes and tabloid headlines, but also given the flop of “Alice Through The Looking Glass” earlier this year. But both Disney and Depp will have one last, big run together with next summer’s “Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” which opens on May 26, 2017. [THR]