THE TRACKING BOARD

 EXCLUSIVE
 〉The duo last appeared together in the 2003 sequel Shanghai Knights.

Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson are set to reprise their roles for the long awaited action-comedy sequel SHANGHAI DAWN. MGM is officially moving forward with the third film in the series that consists of the 2000 film Shanghai Noon, and the 2003 sequel Shanghai Knights. Jonathan Glickman will oversee the project for the studio, with a writer still currently being sought.

The initial film in the series, Shanghai Noon, was a western buddy-comedy that paired Chan’s Chon Wang, a former imperial guard, with Wilson’s Roy O’Bannon, a small-time robber with big dreams, as they partnered up to save a kidnapped princess. The first film was a play on the western genre, with the title being a pun on the classic Gary Cooper film High Noon.

The film came on the heels of the successful buddy cop comedy Rush Hour, which teamed Chan with comedic actor Chris Tucker, refreshing the odd-couple formula that had been proven successful by films such as 48 Hours, with Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte, and Lethal Weapon, starring Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. Shanghai Noon blends elements of the buddy-cop genre with western and martial arts influences. The 1971 film Red Sun, starring Charles Bronson and Toshirō Mifune, is a notable film that previously blended martial arts elements into the western backdrop.

Shanghai Noon was written by writing team Miles Millar and Alfred Gough, who had previously written the successful action-comedy Lethal Weapon 4. The duo would go on to write the sequel Shanghai Knights, the buddy-cop comedy Showtime, which starred Eddie Murphy and Robert DeNiro, and develop the long-running superhero series Smallville. The film marked the directorial debut of Tom Dey, who would go on to direct Showtime, as well as the comedies Failure To Launch and Marmaduke, which reunited the director with Wilson.

Released in 2003, Shanghai Knights kept Millar and Gough on board to write, but favored David Dobkin to direct, who would re-team with Wilson on the 2005 comedy Wedding Crashers, which also starred Vince Vaughn. The story followed the characters to England, where they traced the murderer of Wayne’s father. Shanghai Dawn was initially mentioned in 2003, but never officially got off the ground. MGM is now reviving the Columbia series, using the same title that was originally intended for the third installment.

Growing up in China as a renowned martial artist, Chan made his film debut as a child actor in the Chinese film Big and Little Wong Tin Bar in 1962. Making his American film debut as a driver in the 1981 ensemble comedy The Cannonball Run, Chan would continue to make notable foreign films throughout the 80’s and 90’s, including Twin Dragons and The Legend Of The Drunken Master. The 1998 action-comedy Rush Hour solidified Chan as a screen icon in America, and he would continue to successfully headline numerous American films, including The Tuxedo, Disney’s Around The World In Eighty Days, and the 2010 remake of The Karate Kid. He is set to reprise his role in the upcoming sequel The Karate Kid 2.

Making his debut in the Wes Anderson short Bottle Rocket in 1994, Wilson starred in the ’96 feature film version for Anderson, and became well known for his roles in Meet The Parents, Zoolander, Wedding Crashers, and subsequent Anderson films including The Royal Tenenbaums and The Darjeeling Limited. He was well received for his role in the Woody Allen film Midnight In Paris in 2011, which reuinted him with his Wedding Crashers co-star Rachel McAdams. He is next set to reprise his Zoolander role in the upcoming sequel with Ben Stiller.

Chan is repped by WME. Wilson is repped by UTA.

—TO SEE ALL THE PROJECT DETAILS CLICK HERE—

Lou Chase | Staff Writer