Leonardo DiCaprio is to produce and star in a film about Sam Phillips, the Memphis music producer famous for launching the careers of Elvis Presley, Ike Turner, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis.
Paramount Pictures has acquired rights to adapt Peter Guralnick’s book Sam Phillips: the Man Who Invented Rock’n’Roll, and has enlisted DiCaprio to co-develop it as a star vehicle for himself, according to Deadline.
Mick Jagger will reportedly co-produce alongside DiCaprio. He last produced HBO’s rock series Vinyl that was canceled after one season. DiCaprio has yet to lock down a writer and director for the project.
Phillips – who worked as a record executive, music producer and disc jockey – is credited for playing a vital role in the emergence of rock’n’roll in the 1950s, largely by discovering Presley.
Friday’s announcement caps off a busy week for the actor.
Monday saw him reveal plans to produce a film adaptation of the 1990s children’s cartoon show Captain Planet, about a superhero who fights pollution. On Thursday, it was reported he’s nearing a deal to produce and star in an adaptation of Beth Macy’s non-fiction book Truevine, about two young black brothers in the racially segregated southern US who were kidnapped and displayed as circus freaks.
DiCaprio recently won his first Oscar for The Revenant. His latest project, the climate change documentary Before the Flood, which he features in and produced, just opened in US cinemas.
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