From denofgeek, Disney’s ambitious prequel to The Wizard Of Oz has found its director. And is Robert Downey Jr set to star?
Published on Jun 16, 2010
One of the biggest projects on Disney's upcoming slate looks to be its planned high-budget 3D prequel to The Wizard Of Oz. Clearly buoyed by the $1bn box office gross of Alice In Wonderland (which has also triggered Disney putting a live action Cinderella movie into the works), the studio is pressing ahead with Oz: The Great And Powerful.
The film's focus will be on the Wizard Of Oz before he became Wizard, and how he gets to find himself in the land of Oz for the first time. And the plan is to entice Robert Downey Jr to take on the lead role of The Wizard. He's not signed on the dotted line yet, though, which, given the actor's hardly uncluttered slate of projects, is little surprise. However, Disney is keen to rewrite the movie around the actor should he choose to commit.
One person who already has is director Sam Raimi, finally committed to direct a new movie for the first time since his planned Spider-Man 4 project fell apart at the start of the year. Raimi had been strongly linked with the long-mooted World Of Warcraft movie, but it's now been revealed that he's signed up for Disney's film.
