Oscar-Winning ‘Forrest Gump’ Writer to Pen ‘Shantaram’ Script
October 26, 2005
By Borys Kit
SOURCE:The Hollywood Reporter
Oscar-winning writer Eric Roth has been tapped to adapt the Gregory David Roberts novel Shantaram for Warner Bros. Pictures and Initial Entertainment Group.
Set in the 1980s and based loosely on Roberts’s life, the story centers on an Australian heroin addict convicted of robbery who escapes to India, where he reinvents himself as a doctor. When he gets involved in smuggling and gun-running, his adventurous life leads him to Afghanistan and battles with Russians. Roberts wrote the initial draft.
The book was acquired in October 2004 in a $2 million purchase by Warner and Initial. Brad Pitt’s Plan B and Graham King, through Initial, are producing, as is Johnny Depp, via his Infinitum Nihil banner. Depp also is attached to star.
