Aaron Sorkin is one of the best known names in the screenwriting business, and for a very simple reason: he's damned good at it. The man simply does not have a bad screenplay to his name. Quite the opposite, in fact. Between A Few Good Men, The American President, Charlie Wilson's War, Malice, Moneyball and The Social Network, Sorkin has one of the best track records in the feature film business-- and that's not even counting his terrific television series, Sports Night, The West Wing and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (he even has one more, The Newsroom, ready to air on HBO this Summer).
Citing all those credentials is a long way of saying if you were worried that Walter Isaacson's very popular biography of Apple tycoon Steve Jobs was in the wrong hands, don't be. It simply could not be in better hands at this point. Not as far as the script is concerned, at least.
Sony's press release on the matter doesn't cite who will be directing Steve Jobs or who will take on the title role, but considering powerhouse producer Scott Rudin (who also produced The Social Network) is on board, there's zero doubt it will end up in equally capable hands.
The full press release is below, which also includes info about Sorkin's directorial debut, an adaptation of The Politician, a book about the life and downfall of John Edwards.
CULVER CITY, Calif., May 15, 2012 – Academy Award® winning screenwriter Aaron Sorkin will adapt Steve Jobs, a motion picture based on the best-selling biography of the legendary Apple co-founder by award-winning journalist Walter Isaacson, it was announced today by Amy Pascal, Co-Chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, and Doug Belgrad, President of Columbia Pictures. The project is being produced by Mark Gordon, Scott Rudin and Guymon Casady.
Published late last year, Steve Jobs was Amazon’s best-selling book of 2011. In addition, the biography ranked #1 among bestselling hardcover books by a 2:1 margin, with sales of 2,246,569 in 2011, according to Publisher’s Weekly.
Commenting on the announcement, Pascal said, “Steve Jobs’ story is unique: he was one of the most revolutionary and influential men not just of our time but of all time. There is no writer working in Hollywood today who is more capable of capturing such an extraordinary life for the screen than Aaron Sorkin; in his hands, we’re confident that the film will be everything that Jobs himself was: captivating, entertaining, and polarizing."
AARON SORKIN won the Academy Award® for Best Adapted Screenplay for his work on The Social Network. His other screenplays includeMoneyball, Charlie Wilson’s War, The American President, Malice, and A Few Good Men. He has also acquired the motion picture rights to The Politician, the best-selling book by Andrew Young about the downfall of former Senator John Edwards. He will adapt the book and make his directorial debut with the film, which he will also produce. For television, Sorkin created “The West Wing,” “Sports Night,” and “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.” He is currently in production on the HBO series “The Newsroom,” which is scheduled to premiere on June 24, 2012 <x-apple-data-detectors://1> . For the stage, Sorkin wrote “A Few Good Men” and “Making Movies”; he returned to Broadway in 2007 with “The Farnsworth Invention.” Sorkin will return to the theater and make his Broadway debut as a librettist with the 2013-2014 production of “Houdini.” Based on the life of legendary magician Harry Houdini, the musical will star Hugh Jackman and will feature music and lyrics by Oscar and Grammy winner Stephen Schwartz.