Steve McQueen to write and direct Twelve years A Slave, with Brad Pitt producing

If you still haven't stopped to check out Steve McQueen's 2008 directorial debut, Hunger, then I have to ask what the *?%# are you doing with your life? While a story about the 1981 Irish hunger strike might sound like a tough sit, it almost sounds like a comedy next to what McQueen's lined up next. He'll write and direct Twelve Years a Slave, an adaptation of Solomon Northrup's 1853 autobiography. Chiwetel Ejiafor, an actor I've been saying for years is one great film away from being the next Denzel Washington, is in line to star. I think this may be that key role for him.

Brad Pitt is on board as producer, adding his considerable star power to get this project moving. I'd love to see him in a role somewhere, but until I read the book I couldn't say where he'd fit.  The story is simply amazing and almost hard to believe. Northrup was a freed slave, educated and married with three kids. One day he was approached by two men who wanted to hire him to play his fiddle in Washington, DC as part of a travelling circus. But not long after he arrived he was drugged, his Free Papers stolen, and was chained up and sold as a slave. He spent the next twelve years of his life this way, until finally finding freedom with the aid of a few brave people.

John Ridley(Bobby) is on board to co-write, and right off the bat this sounds like a film we'll be talking about as an Oscar contender. The material is strong, McQueen is a critical darling right now, and Ejiafor has never met a role he couldn't dominate. I'm expecting a lot from this. [THR]