Heat director Michael Mann is getting closer to the start line on his passion project Ferrari thanks to some strong new cast and a big domestic deal with STX.
We can reveal that Oscar nominee Adam Driver, Oscar winner Penélope Cruz and Emmy nominee Shailene Woodley are newly aboard for the big-budget biopic of racing mogul Enzo Ferrari.
Star Wars and House Of Gucci actor Driver is replacing Hugh Jackman in the title role while Parallel Mothers star Cruz will play Enzo’s wife Laura. Big Little Lies star Woodley will play mistress Lina Lardi. Four-time Oscar nominee Mann is gearing up for a May start in Italy.
STX is handling International rights and has now picked up domestic in a big deal with Mann. As we revealed in previous reporting on the project, Amazon is aboard in a handful of international markets. STX International will look to close remaining deals this week with some big international pacts already secured, including Leone in Italy.
The movie, which Mann has been working on for two decades, is set during the summer of 1957. Ex-racecar driver, Ferrari, is in crisis. Bankruptcy stalks the company he and his wife, Laura, built from nothing ten years earlier. Their tempestuous marriage struggles with the mourning for one son and the acknowledgement of another. He decides to counter his losses by rolling the dice on one race – 1,000 miles across Italy, the iconic Mille Miglia.The project has famously been through multiple iterations, but this is as far along as the casting has been at any stage.
Mann will direct from a script by Troy Kennedy Martin (The Italian Job) and Mann based on Brock Yates’ book Enzo Ferrari – The Man and the Machine. The filmmaker is also producing via his Moto Productions banner alongside P.J. van Sandwijk and Birdman producer John Lesher, as well as Lars Sylvest, Thorsten Schumacher and Gareth West with Niels Juul executive-producing.
Michael Mann said today: “Being able to have these wonderfully talented artists, actors Adam Driver, Penélope Cruz and Shailene Woodley, bring to life these unique characters on location in Modena and the Emilia-Romagna is a vision fulfilled.”
Adam Fogelson, Chairman of STXfilms Motion Picture Group commented: “Ferrari is so much more than a story about a man and his machine. It is an extraordinary and emotional story that Michael has been developing for years and the entire team at STX is looking forward to the start of production with this dream cast and filmmaker. Adam Driver is one of the most talented and fascinating actors working today, and we could not be more thrilled to pair him with Penélope, whose legendary career builds with every role she takes.”
Jill Silfen, Executive VP of Business and Legal Affairs for STXfilms, and Harold Brown, of Gang, Tyre, Ramer, Brown & Passman negotiated the domestic deal for the respective parties.
Driver is a two-time Oscar-nominee for his work in BlacKkKlansman and Marriage Story. Recent credits include Annette, The Last Duel and House of Gucci. He next stars in Sony Pictures’ sci-fi thriller 65, as well as Netflix’s White Noise, Noah Baumbach’s adaptation of the Don DeLillo novel.Cruz, nominated this week for the Best Actress Oscar in Parallel Mothers, won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Vicky Cristina Barcelona and was nominated another two times for her roles in Volver and Nine. In addition to Parallel Mothers for Sony, she currently stars in IFC’s Official Competition opposite Antonio Banderas.
Woodley was previously nominated for an Emmy for Big Little Lies and won the Independent Spirit Award for Alexander Payne’s The Descendants. Most recently, she can be seen in The Mauritanian with Jodie Foster and Benedict Cumberbatch. She is currently filming the Showtime limited series Three Women and can next be seen in Damian Szifron’s thriller Misanthrope.
Industry legend Mann is a four-time Academy Award nominee for Best Picture (The Insider, The Aviator), for Best Screenplay (The Insider) and for Best Director (The Insider) and an Emmy winner (The Jericho Mile). His feature writing and directing credits also include Heat, The Last of the Mohicans, Collateral, Public Enemies, Ali, Miami Vice, and Thief. He was also an executive producer on Oscar nominated Ford vs Ferrari.Oscar-winning producer John Lesher, best known for Bird Man, Fury, Hostiles and Black Mass , recently collaborated with Mann on HBO limited series Tokyo Vice, which premieres in April.
BAFTA nominated producer P.J. van Sandwijk, is best known for The Rescue, Locked Down and Ron Howard’s upcoming Thirteen Lives as well as Tom Cruise’s Untitled Space Film, Hollywood’s first narrative feature film set to shoot in outer space. Niels Juul’s credits include The Irishman and Silence.
Driver is represented by Gersh and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern. Cruz is represented by CAA, Untitled Entertainment and Kuranda Management. Woodley is represented by Hyperion, Range Media Partners and Felker Toczek Suddleson Abramson. CAA reps Michael Mann.
