Lionsgate may have pushed back Robin Hood: Origins earlier this week, but that doesn’t mean the studio isn’t eager to venture into medieval England and Sherwood forest. One news nugget that ought to dispel any lingering doubt is that of Eve Hewson’s addition to the film, with The Knick actress filling the coveted role of Maid Marian.
Deadline has the scoop, and they revealed that the studio’s exhaustive casting process meant that no fewer than 100 candidates were considered for the part – quite the coup for Hewson, then. She’ll star opposite Kingsman: The Secret Service‘s Taron Egerton in the reboot-cum-origins tale. As per Lionsgate’s recent reshuffling, Robin Hood: Origins won’t enter production until after Vaughn and Egerton wraps with the Kingsman sequel, meaning director Otto Bathurst won’t be stepping behind the lens until the summer of 2016 at the earliest.
Penned by Joby Harold, Bathurst’s vision for the legendary marksman has been compared to The Dark Knight, laying out a story wherein Robin Hood returns to his beloved Sherwood Forest only to find it overrun with corruption and villainy. Disillusioned with the royals, our protagonist goes full vigilante and forms a crime force of his own. An interesting angle, no doubt.
Such is the Hollywood way, Origins is far from the only project in development concerning the famed men in tights. Over at Disney, Brandon Barker’s Nottingham & Hood is simmering on the edge of development, while Sony is cooking up Hood, a revisionist take that is said to be an amalgamation of Fast and Furious and the Mission: Impossible franchise – quite the elevator pitch, if we do say so ourselves. Jerry Bruckheimer is attached to produce the latter.
Out of the three, it is really Robin Hood: Origins that has broke ahead, even with the recent postponement. Now that production has been penciled in for late summer, we can expect Otto Bathurst’s gritty reboot to grace screens in early-to-mid 2017.