EXCLUSIVE: Matthew McConaughey and Zoe Saldaña are in negotiations to star in the upcoming Netflix pic Positano. The film is in development with Tuner director Daniel Roher on board to direct from a script by Alessandro Tanaka and Brian Gatewood. Working Title founders Eric Fellner and Tim Bevan will produce.
Plot details are being kept under wraps other than it being described as a romantic caper set in the Italian town the film is named after. Amelia Granger will exec produce for Working Title as well as Tanaka and Gatewood.
Working Title landed the hot spec after Tanaka and Gatewood took it to market, with Roher boarding the film as director shortly after. In recent weeks the script landed in front of McConaughey and Saldaña, who immediately were drawn to the story and quickly attached to star. Once the two were on board, Netflix landed the package with plans to fast-track it into production when the deals are closed.
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After taking a break from acting for the past couple of years, McConaughey made his return this fall with the acclaimed Apple thriller The Lost Bus. The film premiered at the Toronto Film Festival and earned McConaughey strong reviews for his portrayal of a school bus driver who heroically saved a group of children during the 2018 fires in Paradise, CA.
Positano marks a reunion for Saldaña and Netflix after the A-lister’s performance in Emilia Pérez earned her the Best Supporting Actress Oscar back in March. Next up, she has James Cameron’s Avatar: Fire and Ash, which opens this weekend worldwide.
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Roher is best known for 2022’s Navalny, which won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, the BAFTA Award for Best Documentary and Sundance’s Festival Favorite Award. His debut narrative feature Tuner, a crime thriller he wrote and directed, stars Dustin Hoffman, Leo Woodall and Havana Rose Liu. The film premiered at this year’s Telluride Film Festival and showed at TIFF shortly after to rave reviews.
McConaughey is repped by WME and Yorn Levine Barnes. Saldana is repped by CAA, LBI Entertainment and Yorn Levine Barnes. Roher is repped by UTA and Gang Tyre Ramer. Tanaka and Gatewood are repped by UTA, Entertainment 360 and Hansen Jacobson Teller,
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