21-year-old British actor to portray track and field star…
‘Attack The Block’ star John Boyega is set to take the lead in a biopic of Olympic athlete Jesse Owens in the Stephen Hopkins-directed biopic ‘Race,’ says Variety.
The film will focus on how Owens, the son of an Alabama sharecropper, shattered Adolf Hitler’s myth of Aryan supremacy at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by winning a record four gold medals in the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash, the long jump and the 400-meter relay. Owens’ victories are considered among the greatest athletic feats of all time.
Set to go before cameras in May in Montreal and Berlin, the film is supported by the Jesse Owens Foundation, the Jesse Owens Trust and the Luminary Group.
Forecast Pictures’ Jean Charles Levy, ID+’s Luc Dayan, Kate Garwood, Stephen Hopkins, Louis-Philippe Rochon, Dominique Seguin of Solofilms, Karsten Brunig and Thierry Potok over at Trinity Race GmbH will produce.
The project is not be confused with Disney’s rival biopic that has Antoine Fuqua (‘Olympus Has Fallen,’ ‘Training Day’) attached to direct.