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Johnny Depp may take on the role of Harry Houdini, says The Hollywood Reporter.
The star is reportedly in negotiations with Lionsgate and Summit to star in their film “The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America’s First Superhero”.
Dean Parisot will direct from a screenplay by Noah Oppenheim which sees Houdini, the world’s greatest escape artist, investigate the occult world. The film is based on a book by Willian Kalush and Larry Sloman.
Below is the novel’s official description
Since his death eighty-eight years ago, Harry Houdini’s life has been chronicled in books, in film, and on television. Now, in this groundbreaking biography, renowned magic expert William Kalush and bestselling writer Larry Sloman team up to find the man behind the myth. Drawing from millions of pages of research, they describe in vivid detail the passions that drove Houdini to perform ever-more-dangerous feats, his secret life as a spy, and a pernicious plot to subvert his legacy.
“The Secret Life of Houdini” traces the arc of the master magician’s life from desperate poverty to worldwide fame—his legacy later threatened by a group of fanatical Spiritualists led by esteemed British author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Initiating the reader along the way into the arcane world of professional magic, Kalush and Sloman decode a life based on deception, providing an intimate and riveting portrayal of Houdini, the man and the legend.
