It’s been some time since we last heard of casting regarding Darren Aronofsky‘s Noah project, which last we heard was looking at a July start in New York and Iceland for a March 28, 2014 release.
So far Russell Crowe‘s attachment as the lead actor is all we’ve heard along with rumblings that we might see a Requiem for a Dream reunion with Jennifer Connelly playing Noah’s wife, but that casting remains up in the air. However, we do have two new names to add to the cast.
Deadline reports Douglas Booth (“The Pillars Of Earth”) and Logan Lerman (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters) have joined the cast as Noah’s son Shem and Noah’s older son, Ham, respectively. Along with the role of Noah’s wife, major roles also yet to be cast include the film’s antagonist (Liam Neeson was once rumored but that isn’t happening) and the love interest for Noah’s eldest son.
Noah is described as a close adaptation of the Biblical story of Noah’s Ark. In a world ravaged by human sin, Noah (Crowe) is given a divine mission: to build an Ark to save creation from the coming flood. The screenplay was written by Aronofsky and Ari Handel and revised by Academy Award-nominated screenwriter John Logan (Gladiator, Hugo).
Meanwhile, the Bible stories don’t stop here as we already know Steven Spielberg is considering making Gods and Kings, a story of Moses and the Israelites’ departure from Egypt with a script by Stuart Hazeldine and Michael Green. That film is set up at Warner Bros. Meanwhile, Fox has their own Moses project in the works and it would seem they have Ridley Scott interested in directing.
In an interview with Esquire, Scott was asked if he’d ever consider a Biblical adaptation to which he answered:
“I’ve got something else in the works. I’m already doing it. It’s called Moses. Seriously, seriously. It’s going to happen… I probably shouldn’t have let that slip out. I’m not supposed to say anything. It’s definitely in the cards, though. What’s interesting to me about Moses isn’t the big stuff that everybody knows. It’s things like his relationship with Ramses [II, the pharaoh]. I honestly wasn’t paying attention in school when I was told the story of Moses. Some of the details of his life are extraordinary.”
The script at Fox, if that is indeed what Scott is referring to, was written by Bill Collage and Adam Cooper.
Scott is moving directly to The Counselor right after Prometheus, both of which are set up at Fox, so it stands to reason perhaps he’ll follow those two films up with Moses, but for now that is all nothing but rumor.
