Let’s take a trip back in time to the magical year of 2010. If someone with modern eyes were to go back and try to live in these olden times, they’d discover themselves in a topsy-turvy bizarro world where the economy was in the toilet, a charismatic figure by the name of Barack Obama was in the White House, and Terry Gilliam was going to make a movie about Don Quixote starring Robert Duvall and Johnny Depp. A lot has changed since then. Ewan McGregor replaced Johnny Depp in Gilliam’s movie, then Gilliam’s movie got cancelled completely, and the White House…well, I’m not sure who’s living there these days. Who can keep track?
Even after all these years though, one thing hasn’t changed: Johnny Depp is still really into the character of Don Quixote. That’s why he’s teaming up with Disney to start developing a new feature film about Miguel de Cervantes’ creation. Deadline has the scoop that the untitled pitch has been shipped out for screenwriting duties to Steve Pink (Grosse Pointe Blank, High Fidelity) and Jeff Morris (The True Memoirs of an International Assassin). Little is known about the project at this point, but it’s said that it’s going to be a modern imagining of the Don Quixote story.
Seeing as he’s on as a producer, does that also mean that Depp will eventually be attached as an actor to play the title character? One can probably assume. So far Martin Scorsese’s Hugo is the only thing he’s got a producer’s credit on that wasn’t a starring vehicle for him as well. What do you think? Could Depp pull off playing the traveling romantic, trying to bring chivalry back to the world? Yeah, probably that’s not a stretch for him at all. But who’s going to play his Sancho Panza? The first name that springs to mind at this early stage: Patton Oswalt. Those two could muster up some pretty good comedic chemistry, don’t you think?