Curran to direct Pacino as Napoleon in 'Betsy and the Emperor' (SCR, THR, IW)

By Nancy Tartaglione

Al Pacino may finally get the chance to play Napoleon. A long-in-the-works screen adaptation of Staton Rabin's children's book, "Betsy and the Emperor," has been taken over by venture capital fund GC Corp. and handed to Killer Films to begin production in late fall. John Curran will direct the film which previously had Patrice Chereau behind the camera for Azor Films and BackUp Films.

GC, which took a 50% equity stake in Killer last year, will secure financing on the project that focuses on the emperor's waning years in exile on Saint Helena and his relationship there with a 14-year-old British girl. Pacino is set as Napoleon, say reports.

Brian Edgar will adapt the screenplay.

Killer Films' Christine Vachon and Pamela Koffler are producing with original producers Zvi Howard Rosenman, Colleen Camp and Fonda Snyder. John Wells will serve as executive producer with GC Corp co-chief Adi Cohen.

The project has a complicated history. Rights to Rabin's book were acquired by Chereau's Azor Films in 2006 after a lengthy untangling process. The film at the time, going by the title "The Monster of Longwood," was budgeted at $20 million and set to just beat another Napoleon project, "Napoleon and Betsy," to the screen.

The latter project had been set up by Scarlett Johansson at Millenium/Nu Image with the actress - who had at one time been attached to the Chereau project - attached to star and Benjamin Ross attached to direct.

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Dueling Napoleon projects race to the screen (SCR, sub)