Adam McKay could be reuniting with his Big Short stars Christian Bale and Steve Carell for another biopic. Variety has reported that Bale, Carell and Amy Adams are in talks to star in McKay’s currently untitled film about the life of former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney. Bale will play Cheney while Adams plays his wife Lynne Cheney, and Carell as Donald Rumsfeld.
McKay will direct the film from a screenplay he wrote with Brad Pitt’s Plan B and McKay’s Gary Sanchez Productions, with Will Ferrell and Kevin Messick producing.
McKay has said he’s always found Cheney’s polarizing status in American history interesting and said he spent hours researching the former V.P. He’s had a long history in politics, serving under four different Presidents and was a central and controversial figure to the War on Terror in the wake of 9/11.
“I’ve always found Cheney fascinating,” McKay once said. “Questions of what drove him, what his beliefs were; but once we started digging I was astounded at how much he had shaped modern America’s place in the world and how shocking the methods were by which he gained his power.”
Paramount is looking to film in the spring and hopes for an awards-season push. If the trio are cast in the film, we should hear about it soon.
Originally published April 6, 2017. Updated April 15, 2018.
