Shantaram

[Brian in Mesa]

Johnny Depp to Produce & Star in Shantaram
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
October 7, 2004

Warner Bros. Pictures, Initial Entertainment Group, Plan B and Johnny Depp's Infinitum Nihil together have acquired film rights to the Gregory David Roberts' Shantaram: A Novel, which is scheduled for publication next week by St. Martin's Press, says The Hollywood Reporter. Johnny Depp will star in the film and produce with Brad Grey and Graham King.

Depp would play the novel's narrator, a young Australian man who escapes from a prison Down Under and goes on to build a new life for himself in the slums of India before going to fight with insurgents in their struggle against the Russians in Afghanistan.

Roberts will adapt the book, which is set in the 1980s and was originally published in August of 2003.

 

[Brian in Mesa]

Peter Weir to Direct Depp in Shantaram
Source: Variety
December 1, 2005

Peter Weir (Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World) will direct Shantaram, the Warner Bros. adaptation of the Gregory David Roberts novel that will star Johnny Depp. Variety says Weir will develop the script with Eric Roth. The studio hopes to begin production late next year.

The film is being produced by Initial Entertainment Group's Graham King along with Depp's Infinitum Nihil and Plan B's Brad Pitt.

The film's protagonist is an Australian heroin addict who escapes a maximum-security prison and reinvents himself in India as a doctor in the slums of Bombay. His attempt to find medicine for his destitute patients leads him into counterfeiting, gunrunning and smuggling.

WB executives envisioned an epic film when they agreed to pay $2 million for worldwide rights to the novel last year.

 

[joeshmo]

If you havent read the book yet, check it out. It is really good. I have always invisioned it as a movie, and Depp in this character is brilliant. Cant wait.

 

[Brian in Mesa]

Mira Nair to Direct Depp's Shantaram
Source: Variety
January 19, 2007

Variety reports that Mira Nair will direct the big-budget Johnny Depp-starrer Shantaram for Warner Bros. Pictures, with Graham King's Initial Entertainment Group and Depp's Infinitum Nihil producing. Brad Pitt's Plan B is a producer as well.

Production is likely to begin as soon as this fall, with a possible 2008 release. Nair will direct from a script by Eric Roth, who is adapting Gregory David Roberts' novel of the same name. The novel is based partly on the author's own adventures, according to publisher St. Martin's Press.

In Shantaram, an Australian heroin addict escapes from a maximum-security prison and reinvents himself as a doctor treating the destitute in the slums of Bombay. His drive to procure medicine leads him into counterfeiting, gun-running and smuggling.

Nair's credits include Vanity Fair, with Reese Witherspoon, Monsoon Wedding, and upcoming The Namesake.