John Carney who is a name behind the critically acclaimed original musicials such as Sing Street and Once, will direct a Bee Gees pic for Paramount Pictures. For the biopic, John Logan will pen down the script.
GK Films’ production is handled by Graham King, along with Spielberg, Amblin, Elisabeth Murdoch, Stacey Snider, and Jane Featherstone as executive producers.
Barry Gibb, who was featured in HBO’s moving documentary How Can You Mend a Broken Heart about the Gibb siblings, will help produce the narrative picture. Following today’s director switch, Paramount postponed the film’s release date.
The Bee Gees had a global sales of more than 220 million records, making them one of the best-selling acts in music history.
After forming in the late 1950s with folk and soft rock, Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb first began performing together. After writing songs for Saturday Night Fever that fueled the disco revolution and resulted in one of the best-selling albums ever, they earned five Grammys, including Album of the Year.
Despite their enormous popularity, wealth, and prominence on the 1970s cultural landscape, when there was a backlash to the entire polyester scene, their status as Disco’s mascot unexpectedly put them on their heels.
The remaining brothers retired the group’s name after 45 years of effort upon Maurice Gibb’s unexpected death in January 2003 at the age of 53.
After breaking up, the Bee Gees re-formed in 2009. However, Robin died three years later, at age 62, leaving Barry Gibb to carry on the band’s legacy.
GK Films is no stranger to the musical biopic, having helped Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody achieve box office and Oscar success.
In recent years, Paramount has been active in the biopic genre, producing both the Elton John biopic Rocket Man and a Bob Marley film with Kingsley Ben-Adir.’
Kenneth Branagh was originally set to direct, but he had to drop out owing to scheduling difficulties that included a lengthy awards campaign for Belfast, which won him the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay last Sunday.
This is the first time that Carney has taken on a project based on real-life musicians; however, he has a long history of directing award-winning original musicals.
He has a lot of credits to his name: Begin Again, Sing Street, and the film adaptation of Once. His breakthrough song won the Oscar for best song and was subsequently staged on Broadway winning eight Tonys.
After his show was cancelled, he spent the next two years developing and running Amazon Studios’ Modern Love, which he created and is based on New York Times columns of the same name.
Logan, the three-time Oscar nominee who won a Tony Award for his play Red and is currently represented on Broadway with the musical Moulin Rouge. WME represented Prince and CAA represented Logan.