Enron, Eliot Spitzer, Jack Abramoff, Hunter S. Thompson, Guantanamo Bay and now Julian Assange. Documentary director Alex Gibney has found the subject for his next film and he’s lined up a major studio to back the production.
Deadline reports that Universal has picked up the rights to a documentary about the notorious Wikileaks founder that will be directed by Alex Gibney. The news come hot on the heels of reports that surfaced yesterday that a feature film treatment was in the works based on the upcoming biography “The Most Dangerous Man in the World” by journalist Andrew Fowler.
While it’s still unclear if Assange will participate in the documentary, the truth is the dude needs money for mounting legal fees stemming from a sexual assault case in Sweden and we don’t see him turning down an opportunity to do something that will not only help offset those costs, but allow him to speak at length and more clearly, rather than in selected soundbites.
Anyway, he was certainly was (and still is) one of the more fascinating and polarizing figures of the past year (despite what Time magazine thinks) and a documentary helmed by one of the genre’s finest directors should prove to be immensely involving. But we have to ask — when was the last time a major studio touched a documentary? Clearly Universal believes that truth is stranger fiction and that the story will be something that everyone wants to see.