A tough based-on-a-true story AIDS-and-drugs drama doesn’t exactly seem like the usual domain for Matthew McConaughey. In fact, “The Dallas Buyer’s Club” has been knocking around for years with Marc Forster and Brad Pitt (who are now doing “World War Z” together) set to take it on at one point, while more recently, Ryan Gosling and Craig Gillespie were looking to make it but the picture never got off the ground. But this spring, McConaughey put his name to the project to get it going again and now another major name has come aboard.
Deadline reports that Hilary Swank is now also attached to the project that Content Films picked up the rights to in the very hot marketplace at Cannes. The film is based on the true story of Ron Woodruff, a man who in 1986 is diagnosed with AIDS and given only months to live, strikes out and starts toying around with underground drugs not approved for use in the U.S. at the time. He would end up living longer than expected and began getting these drugs in the hands of other AIDS sufferers as well.
The film originally had a script written by Guillermo Arriaga (”Babel,” “21 Grams”), but it appears it’s been rewritten or redrafted as Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack (“Bill,” Tarsem‘s Snow White project) are credited now. Jean Marc-Vallée (”C.R.A.Z.Y.,” “The Young Victoria”) will sit in the director’s chair.
This is some great news for a project that has worlds of potential to be a great film — let’s just hope this iteration makes it in front of cameras this time.
