Getty Images / Tor Books
Netflix is developing a film based on John Scalzi’s sci-fi novel Old Man’s War, the first in his bestselling six-book series that was nominated for a Hugo Award. Jon Shestack Productions and Madhouse Entertainment will produce the film.
The story takes place centuries in the future when citizens are given a choice to age and die on Earth or join the interstellar Colonial Union, having their minds transferred into battle-ready versions of their younger selves. One such citizen is John Perry, a 75-year-old widower who leads his platoon against alien races, who encounters a younger version of his late wife while on the battlefield.
The movie will be produced by Shestack with Madhouse’s Robyn Meisinger and Adam Kolbrenner while Scalzi and Madhouse’s Ryan Cunningham will act as EPs.
Shestack’s most recent production was the Open Road adaptation of Before I Fall, while Madhouse produced the Denis Villeneuve thriller Prisoners with Warner Bros. and Alcon, and the recently-wrapped Screen Gems horror film Slender Man scheduled for May 2018.
A former president of the Science Fiction Writers of America and a three-time Hugo Award winner, Scalzi has a number of projects in development with FX and Working Title so far, and has signed a 10-year 13-book deal with Tor Books.
The project will continue Netflix’s general interest in science fiction with series like Stranger Things, The OA, the Wachowski’s Sense8 and the upcoming series Altered Carbon.
Scalzi is repped by Joel Gotler of IPG with the Ethan Ellenberg Agency and Matt Sugarman of Weintraub Tobin, who also put together the deal for Shestack and Madhouse along with Myman Greenspan Fox.
Deadline initially reported on this project
Edward Douglas | East Coast Editor
