The wild true story of John McAfee, the founder of McAfee Associates who created the first commercial antivirus software, is headed to the big-screen in the dark-comedy KING OF THE JUNGLE, and Deadline reports that Michael Keaton (SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING) will be playing the leading role alongside Seth Rogen.
Based upon the Wired magazine article "John McAfee's Last Stand," the film will tell the "wild true story of rogue tech magnate McAfee (Keaton), creator of the McAfee Antivirus software, who cashed-in his fortune, left civilization, and moved to the jungle in Belize. There, he set-up a Colonel Kurtz-like compound of guns, sex and madness. In the film, Wired magazine investigator Ari Furman accepts what he thinks is a run-of-the-mill assignment to interview McAfee, but once he arrives in Belize, he finds himself pulled into McAfee’s escalating paranoia, unhinged reality, and murder." Seth Rogen will be playing Ari Furman, with Glenn Ficarra and John Requa (I LOVE YOU PHILLIP MORRIS) helming the film from a script by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (American Horror Story). If the project sounds familiar, it's because it was announced over a year ago with Johnny Depp (FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE CRIMES OF GRINDELWALD) in the title role, but I feel like Michael Keaton is the far better choice.
Michael Keaton will next be seen in Tim Burton's DUMBO on March 29, 2019 as V.A. Vandemere, a ruthless and enigmatic entrepreneur who acquires a circus to exploit the titular elephant. As for Seth Rogen, he also has a Disney film on the horizon as he's set to voice Pumbaa for Jon Favreau's THE LION KING on July 19, 2019.