I’ve been watching Chiwetel Ejiofor’s career for a long while now and he’s always been an actor who stands out. This is mainly because I’ve always trusted in his characters he portrays and, yes, even LOVE, ACTUALLY. After the deserved recognition and success of the unforgettable 12 YEARS A SLAVE, he’s a wanted man and seemingly rumoured for everything up and coming, Cumberbatch must be a little pleased that some of the spotlight has moved onto him for a while.
Ejiofor is now attached to MARCHING POWDER, another real-life tale but this time set in South America. Based on Rusty Young and Thomas McFadden’s book, it tells the story of drug trafficking, a journalist and an unbelievably corrupt prison that basically runs itself. To be honest, the book summary tells you more and with it an equally haunting and unique insight:
Rusty Young was backpacking in South America when he heard about Thomas McFadden, a convicted English drug trafficker who ran tours inside Bolivia’s notorious San Pedro prison. Intrigued, the young Australian journalisted went to La Paz and joined one of Thomas’s illegal tours. They formed an instant friendship and then became partners in an attempt to record Thomas’s experiences in the jail. Rusty bribed the guards to allow him to stay and for the next three months he lived inside the prison, sharing a cell with Thomas and recording one of the strangest and most compelling prison stories of all time.
San Pedro is not your average prison. It is a place where corrupt politicians and drug lords live in luxury apartments, while the poorest prisoners are subjected to squalor and deprivation. Violence is a constant threat, and sections of San Pedro that echo with the sound of children by day house some of Bolivia’s busiest cocaine laboratories by night.
So, Ejiofor wouldn’t exactly be moving towards light-hearted but you can definitely understand the desire and pull to tell another important story.
These are early days as New Regency have just acquired the rights but we’ll bring you all the news as we get it for MARCHING POWDER.
Source: Deadline
