J.K. Simmons says Kong: Skull Island will take place in 1971 Detroit

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

Last week we heard that Michael Keaton was in talks to join Legendary Pictures’ upcoming King Kong reboot, KONG: SKULL ISLAND. He joins the already cast Tom Hiddleston and the newly Oscar nominated J.K. Simmons in the film directed by Jordan Vogt-Roberts. We might be getting closer to finding out just what this movie has in store for us thanks to a chatty Simmons. He recently talked about the time period for the film, which all we knew about prior was that it took place "in the mysterious and dangerous home of the king of the apes".

MTV caught up with Simmons and the actor revealed that while he was skeptical at first about the new King Kong movie, Roberts was able to win him over:

When it first came to my attention, ‘There’s interest in you for a new King Kong,’ I thought, ‘Okay, why? I met with Jordon Vogt-Roberts who’s going to be directing it, and John Gatins who’s gonna be writing, and Tom [Hiddleston]—Jordan was just so passionate and so smart and there’s such an interesting new take on it, and it’s set in Detroit in 1971 which is where I grew up, and we’re gonna shoot in Detroit during baseball season and I’ll be able to go to Tigers games, so there’s a lot to like about this movie.

It sounds like he was more swayed by the notion that he would get to go to baseball games during the making of this movie, I love that. That new timeline certainly sounds interesting though, 1971 Detroit could be a lot of fun for the hometown actor too. It should be able to keep intact the lore of Kong that we all recognize while bringing new (and necessary if you ask me) changes like this timeline. It won’t get confused with Peter Jackson’s 1930-set Kong remake that’s for sure.

KONG: SKULL ISLAND opens in IMAX 3D on March 10, 2017.

Here is the video of Simmons’ reveal: