Director Robert Zemeckis may be wishing upon a star in the near future! Variety reports that the acclaimed ‘Forrest Gump’ and ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit?’ filmmaker is in early negotiations to helm Disney’s live-action remake of its animated classic ‘Pinocchio.’ Previously, ‘Paddington’ director Paul King was attached to the project, but stepped down from the gig at the start of the year. However the site notes that Zemeckis has yet to officially sign on the project.
According to Variety, Zemeckis has been circling the film since this summer, but did not want to commit to a new film until he was further along in the production of his current project, ‘The Witches.’ With that project now in the post-production stage, Zemeckis has since begun to consider several possible projects for his next film- with ‘Pinocchio’ reportedly being a very high possibility.
The screenplay is from King (‘Paddington,’ ‘Paddington 2′), Simon Farnaby (Mindhorn,’ ‘Paddington 2’), and Chris Weitz (‘Cinderella,’ ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’).
Fascinatingly, Disney is not the only studio currently working on a new film adaptation of ‘Pinocchio.’ It was reported last year that director ‘The Shape od Water’s Guillermo del Toro was working on a new adaptation of the tale for Netflix. Assuming that Zemeckis does sign up to direct Disney’s live-action remake, it will be interesting to see how his film will ultimately compare and contrast to that of del Toro’s version.
Source: Variety