Lionsgate has acquired the global film rights to ‘Malko’, which is adapted from Gerard de Villiers’ best-selling action-spy series ‘S.A.S.’ and stars Irish actor Michael Fassbender.
The two-time Academy Award-nominated actor (‘Steve Jobs’, ‘12 Years a Slave’) is also set to produce the project.
De Villiers’ espionage thrillers have sold over 120 million copies worldwide and serialised through 200 books. The film, which will largely focus on de Villier’s book Checkpoint Charlie, is being adapted for screen by Oscar-nominated screenwriter Eric Warren Singer (‘American Hustle’, ‘Top Gun: Maverick’).
According to Deadline, Fassbender will play the super spy for hire Malko Linge, an Austrian nobleman and freelance CIA operative who spent his formative years in a special Nazi work camp for captured spies. Malko learned the intricate dark arts of tradecraft from the best. Now, an adult living in a reclaimed family manor fallen into disrepair, Malko becomes a spy for hire. He is the ultimate agent without an agency – a gentleman warrior without a country who works according to his own moral code and lives the only way a man who has grown up in the face of death can: with a wicked wit and a lust for all things in life, even the things that might kill him.
The Lionsgate deal was struck with Black Magic’s Lars Slvest who developed the material with Gérard de Villiers and Thorsten Schumacher. Rocket Science will also produce the project with Lionsgate.
“We are enormously excited to be teaming with Greg Shapiro and Michael Fassbender, as well as Lars Sylvest from Black Magic and Thorsten Schumacher from Rocket Science, to develop Malko,” said Lionsgate Motion Picture Group chairman Joe Drake. “This is a character with a tremendous 200 title library of amazing spy stories to draw from and we believe we have a world-class creative team in place with Michael and Eric Warren Singer as we move forward on this project.”
In addition to Fassbender, who will produce through his DMC Film production company, other ‘Malko’ producers include Rocket Science’s Thorsten Schumacher, Kingsgate Films’ Greg Shapiro and Black Magic’s Lars Sylvest. Writer Eric Warren Singer, Jason Clark and DMC’s Conor McCaughan will serve as executive producers. Senior Vice President of Production James Myers will oversee the project for Lionsgate alongside Director of Development Brady Fujikawa.
The Kerry native is also due to begin production on David Sandberg’s action-comedy ‘Kung Fury’ this summer, which he will also produce through his production company DMC Films.