Friday, February 20, 2015

Timothy Olyphant Tipped For Snowden Biopic

Variety reports that "Justified" star Timothy Olyphant is in in talks to join the now untitled biopic once known as The Snowden Files.


"JFK" and "Platoon" director Oliver Stone has plans to adapt author Luke Harding's book  Stone co-wrote the adapted screenplay with Kieran Fitzgerald. Harding was a journalist at the British paper The Guardian which was involved in the early revelations about the material  Edward Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) leaked to the media a year ago. Charged with espionage, Snowden exiled himself to Russia where he's been living ever since. The secrets dealt with the U.S. government's intelligence-gathering operations, especially the NSA.

Olyphant would play a Central Intelligence agent who befriended Snowden before he fled to Russia.

Melissa Leo would play Laura Poitras, the documentary filmmaker who helmed "Citizenfour" and contributed to the reporting of the story when it broke. Zachary Quinto would play Glenn Greenwald, the lawyer and journalist whom Snowden chose to leak sensitive information to. Tom Wilkinson would play Ewen MacAskill, the defense and intelligence correspondent for The Guardian who helped break the story.

Scott Eastwood will play an NSA agent who leads the investigation to determine Snowden's M.O.Shailene Woodley ("Divergent") is tipped to play the role of Snowden's girlfriend in the film.

Stone Eric Kopeloff and Moritz Borman will produce the film and have closed a deal with Snowden’s Russian lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, for the film rights to his novel "Time Of The Octopus" as a second source for the film. Kucherena's book js based on the Russian lawyer's time with Snowden while he waited in limbo at the Moscow Airport before the Russian government decided to grant him asylum.

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