Move over, Katniss. Lionsgate’s Summit Entertainment has found its next franchise hero: Julius Caesar. The company, whose franchise fare has included Twilight Saga, The Hunger Games and Divergent, has signed on with White Horse Pictures to co-produce Emperor, the first in what could be a trilogy of films about the rise of Julius Caesar and his best friend and eventual mortal enemy Marcus Brutus.
Emperor will be based on the first two books written by Iggulden — The Gates Of Rome and The Field Of Swords — that establish the relationship between Caesar (the great military leader) and Marcus (the great fighter) from boyhood. The books cover their rise to the top of the Roman Empire, and the political and romantic entanglements that culminate in that fatal encounter on the floor of the Roman Senate. The final novel covers the revenge taken on Caesar’s murderers by Octavius and Mark Antony.
They began work on the film several years ago when they ran Exclusive Media Group, and Sinclair will produce with Hollywood Gang Productions’ Gianni Nunnari and Atmosphere Entertainment’s Mark Canton, and Mark Jackson. East and William Broyles Jr will be exec producers with Tony To. A script is in by Broyles (Cast Away and Apollo 13), Stephen Harrigan (Hallmark’s Cleopatra), Burr Steers (Pride, Prejudice And Zombies) and Ian Mackenzie Jeffers (The Grey). The fact-based tale has the kind of sexuality, political intrigue, battles and thirst for power evident in a series like HBO’s Game Of Thrones. It is high priority for Lionsgate/Summit, and they will search for a director straight away.
“Combining the sweep of 300 with the intrigue of Game of Thrones, this is the part of the story of the mighty Julius Caesar that nobody knows – his emergence alongside Brutus as young powerhouses in Rome, a fresh and contemporary retelling of their rivalries, passions and jealousies, captured in a movie with breath-taking action, spectacular visual effects and epic scope.”
