UPDATE – Deadline is reporting that Raimi accepted the deal from Disney, signed the contract and will make OZ THE GREAT AND POWERFUL with Robert Downey, Jr. his next film.
Disney is hot to get someone in the director’s chair for their WIZARD OF OZ prequel OZ THE GREAT AND POWERFUL.
While Sam Mendes (AMERICAN BEAUTY) and Adam Shankman (HAIRSPRAY) were reportedly in the running, Vulture says that the studio has now made a formal offer to Sam Raimi to follow the yellow brick road.
Whether Raimi accepts the assignment remains to be seen. With SPIDER-MAN off his plate, Raimi has a bunch of things he’s been producing and developing, most notably a big-screen adaptation of the WORLD OF WARCRAFT videogame, but he hasn’t committed to his next directing effort. There has also been speculation of him replacing the just-departed Guillermo del Toro on THE HOBBIT, assuming that studio situation ever gets resolved.
This OZ tale (formerly known as BRICK) is being produced by ALICE IN WONDERLAND’s Joe Roth, and explores how the Wizard of Oz arrived in the psychedelic fantasy realm as part of a traveling circus from Kansas before he ultimately stepped behind the curtain. Disney is rushing to beat other competing projects based on L. Frank Baum’s “Oz” books that are in the public domain.
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