Oz Overload!

Sam Raimi has been offered to direct the upcoming prequel Oz: The Great and Powerful reports New York Magazine.

Sam Mendes ("American Beauty") and Adam Shankman ("Hairspray") have been circling the pic for weeks but, the paper's sources claim Raimi has already received an official offer.

Robert Downey Jr. will star in the film which tells of how the Wizard arrived in Oz and became the ruler of the Emerald City. Mitchell Kapner penned the script.

The project is one of at least a half dozen projects based on L. Frank Baum's classic literary property currently in the works, most being original spins on the property rather than direct adaptations.

The list includes the sequel to The Wizard of Oz called Surrender Dorothy" which Zach Helm ("Stranger Than Fiction") penned and Drew Barrymore is rumoured to be directing; the animated musical "Dorothy of Oz " announced last Friday; the film adaptation of the hit musical Wicked a project simply called Oz by Darren Lemke; a darker and twisted take on the Oz books by Josh Olson and Todd McFarlane called Oz: The Return to Emerald City; and a CG-animated pic from John Boorman

Got all that?

There's Variety's take on the story as well for more on Raimi possibly taking the job