Guy Ritchie has gotten back into Hollywood’s good graces after knocking “Sherlock Holmes” out of the park, but after he films the sequel this summer, his slate will pretty much be open. He was attached to “Lobo” for a while but producer Joel Silver (thankfully) took him off that, pretty much giving him his pick of projects and now Pajiba is reporting that the director is circling “Excalibur.” But wait, isn’t Bryan Singer attached to direct “Excalibur” as well?
The answer, surprisingly, is yes. Warner Bros have put two competing projects into development. Ritchie’s film is based on a treatment by writer Warren Ellis that the author says “differs from the prior 751 King Arthur movies in many ways, but perhaps most obviously in that it is very specifically about the gathering of the Knights.” Singer’s film is apparently more in line with John Boorman’s 1981 film.
So the question remains, which will get in front of camera’s first? The word is that Singer’s film doesn’t even have a script, while Ellis’ treatment has apparently been sent out to writers by WB to be turned into a viable script. We think it’s safe to say that Ritchie’s film will probably get there first, but it’s not like Singer doesn’t have an already staggering number of films (“Battlestar Galactica,” “X-Men: First Class,” “Jack The Giant Killer”) all in various stages of development.
