EXCLUSIVE: You could have imagined Steve McQueen playing prodigal existentially conflicted biker gang leader Jax Teller in Sons Of Anarchy, so it doesn’t seem a stretch to envision Charlie Hunnam taking on the role originated by McQueen in the 1973 classic prison escape drama Papillon. Wolf Of Wall Street producer Red Granite is putting it together for a fall shoot with Danish director Michael Noer attached to direct a script by Prisoners scribe Aaron Guzikowski.
I hear that’s the conversation going on right now. McQueen played a man unjustly convicted of murder in 1930s France and condemned to life in a South American prison. He plots his escape, aided by a counterfeiter (Dustin Hoffman co-starred) who finances Papillon’s prison escapes in exchange for protection in prison. Tale was scripted by Dalton Trumbo and Lorenzo Semple Jr, directed by Franklin J Schaffner from French convict Henri Charriere’s autobiography.
Hunnam completed shooting the title role of the Guy Ritchie-directed King Arthur: Knights Of The Roundtable, a franchise launch for Warner Bros behind the script by Joby Harold. Hunnam also has the James Gray-directed Lost City Of Z coming.
Producers are Red Granite’s Riza Aziz and Joey McFarland, along with Ram Bergman and Roger Corbi. Executive producers are David Koplan, Yan-Fischer-Romanovsky, Joshua D. Mauer, Terrence Chang and Martin Hellstern.
Hunnam is repped by CAA and Brillstein Entertainment and attorney David Weber.
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