Claudius costs cash

If you had two million bucks, you might’ve won the bidding war for the Roman Empire historical book I, CLAUDIUS. But you don’t have that kinda disposable income, which is why veteran producer Scott Rudin now holds the pricey property in his hands instead. Don’t fret, you probably would’ve just blown the money on whores, drugs and fast cars anyway.

Rudin snapped up the screen rights to Robert Graves’ book, written from the perspective of Rome’s fourth emperor and chronicling the lame, stammering Claudius from childhood to the days of Caligula, with all the wondrous violence, duplicity and bacchanalia that made Rome infamous. Leonardo Dicaprio and his Oscar-winning DEPARTED writer William Monahan were also trying to get their mitts on the faux autobiography, but are now expected to join Rudin for the eventual movie and orgies.

The book was previously adapted as a 1976 BBC miniseries that featured the likes of Derek Jacobi, Brian Blessed, John Hurt, Patrick Stewart and John Rhys-Davies.