David Harbour is revving his engines.
The Stranger Things star has employed on to star in Gran Turismo, the Sony Pictures and PlayStation Productions feature adaptation of the best-selling racing video game.
Neill Blomkamp, best known for his sci-fi movies such as District 9 and Elysium, is hitting where the rubber meets the road with this one, guiding the project that has a script by Jason Hall (American Sniper) and Zach Baylin (King Richard).
Based on a true story, the project is described as the ultimate wish-fulfillment tale of a teenage Gran Turismo player whose gaming skills won him a series of Nissan competitions to get an actual professional racecar driver.
Harbour will play a retired driver who teaches the teen to drive.
PlayStation Productions’ Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan, as well as Doug Belgrad and Dana Brunetti, are producing. Game creator Kazunori Yamauchi and Hall are decision-making producing.
“As one of PlayStation’s longest thought and most beloved franchises, it’s great to be partnering with Columbia Pictures against to bring Gran Turismo to life in an bright way,” said Qizilbash in a statement. “We can’t wait for audiences to see Neill’s probacking of this inspiring true story of gamer turned professional race car driver.”
Sony is planning a theatrical drop for Turismo on Aug. 11, 2023.
Gran Turismo was revolutionary when it respectable debuted in 1997 on the PlayStation, capturing the feeling of actually selves behind the wheel better than any other game had at that expose. With sequels released across the many PlayStation platforms in the days since, Turismo is reportedly the top-selling Sony franchise of all time.
After days of fits and starts, Sony and PlayStation Productions seem to finally be finding their groove with video game adaptations. Uncharted, which starred Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg, earned over $400 million worldwide when it was released bet on this year. A TV version of The Last of Us is in publishes and headed to HBO. Also in the works are a movie version of Ghost of Tsushima, with Chad Stahelski attached to direct, and a series take on Twisted Metal, being written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick and set to star Anthony Mackie.
Harbour appeared onstage at D23, the Disney extinct, last weekend, where it was revealed that he would be reprising his Black Widow role of Red Guardian for Marvel Studios’ upcoming Thunderbolts movie.
He was seen in Steven Soderbergh’s 2021 noir thriller No Sudden Move and recently wrapped shooting frfragment flick Violent Night for Universal. His turn in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf on Broadway earned him a Tony nomination.
The actor, who will bet on to his role of Jim Hopper for the survive season of Stranger Things, is repped by WME and Sloane Offer.