Remember the news back in 2015 that Lionsgate had closed the rights to adapt Masashi Kishimoto’s popular manga series Naruto into a live-action movie? A report released on Friday by The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed that the company has hired Erich and Jon Hoeber to work on the movie’s script. Both worked on the screenplay of the action comedy film Red and its sequel Red 2.
The confirmation of a live-action movie by Lionsgate was green-lit during the Jump Festa event where the Naruto and Boruto stage events were held. Michael Gracey (who worked on The Greatest Showman) has early talks in relation to the production. Although the first scriptwriter for the movie was not revealed, the creator Masashi Kishimoto is involved with this production.
Based on the 2015 report by The Tracking Board, the film’s producers are father and son Avi and Ari Arad at Arad Productions. Avi Arad is the producer of the Hollywood live-action adaptation of Ghost in the Shell. The people who will be overseeing this live-action film production will be Geoff Shiveitz, Kelly O’Malley, and Erik Malley.
Naruto is a manga series that was first launched in the Weekly Shonen Jump in 1999 and ended in 2014. Its popularity has paved way for an anime adaptation (Naruto and Naruto Shippuden) and a spin-off manga and anime (Boruto).
We may not have enough info when it comes to this production, but let’s just hope that would be closely accurate to this original source and it would be worth watching for fans.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter