For a while there, riding in the wake of the success of "Crazy Heart," director Scott Cooper put his name to a not insignificant number of potential projects, before finally mounting "Out Of The Furnace" last year. And it looks like one of those movies is moving on without him.
Waltes Salles is in talks to direct "The Man In The Rockefeller Suit" for Fox Searchlight, which should mark a pretty interesting gear shift from the director of "The Motorcycle Diaries" and the upcoming "On The Road." Based on the book by Mark Seal, this is a fascinating true story that tells the tale of Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, a German-born conman who for decades passed himself off as Clark Rockefeller, a member of the famed and powerful family, rising up the social ladder as a result.
The project is still in early stages, and a writer is still being sought to adapt the book so it could be a way off. And while it remains to be seen if he’ll reteam with his longtime collaborator Jose Rivera, the material does seem to fit into Salles’ thematic wheelhouse. "Walter is very interested in examining the underbelly of the American dream, the rotting of the dream," Rivera said last fall, and certainly this book seems to investigate someone striving for that dream, albeit in a morally corrupt manner.
Interesting stuff, and it’s one we’ll put on the radar as Salles figures out where he goes next. [Variety]