EXCLUSIVE: Here’s a splashy European project to end the week: Gerard Butler’s Has Fallen film franchise is getting the television treatment, with filming set to get underway at the end of the month.
Respected French filmmaker and actor Mathieu Kassovitz will lead the cast of Paris Has Fallen, which will be made by StudioCanal, War of the Worlds producer Urban Myth Films, and two companies behind the film franchise: Millennium Media and Butler’s G-Base.
Howard Overman, the creator of BAFTA-winning series Misfits, is writing Paris Has Fallen. Oded Ruskin is directing having previously worked on series including Hulu’s No Man’s Land. Shooting will commence on May 30 in London and Paris.
Paris Is Fallen is set up at Canal+ in France; ZDF in Germany; Canal+ International in Poland and Africa; and M7 in Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, and Slovakia. StudioCanal is preparing to shop the eight-part series to U.S. and UK buyers over the coming months.
Kassovitz will star as Vincent, a protection officer to a French Minister, who is the target of a terror group led by villain Jacob. Vincent works with MI6 operative Zara to keep the politician safe, but they eventually unravel a wider plot, suspecting that a security service colleague is feeding information to Jacob, who is always a step ahead in his mission to bring down Paris.
Butler, who plays all-action U.S. Secret Service agent Mike Banning in the film franchise, is not officially attached to star in the TV adaptation, but Deadline hears he could make a cameo. Deals for other cast members are currently being finalized.
Kassovitz is best known for directing iconic feature La Haine and starring in movies such as Amelie. Most recently he has directed and starred in the hit French political series Le Bureau Des Legends.
Johnny Capps, Julian Murphy, and Overman will produce Paris Has Fallen for Urban Myth, which is owned by StudioCanal. Overseeing for G-Base is Butler and Alan Siegel, and for Millenium Avi Lerner, Jeffrey Greenstein, Jonathan Yunger, and Yariv Lerner.
There have been three Have Fallen films — Olympus Has Fallen (2013), London Has Fallen (2016), and Angel Has Fallen (2019) — and a fourth, Night Has Fallen, remains in the works. The first three films have grossed more than $500M worldwide.
Deadline revealed last year that Overman is penning a TV adaptation of The Wicker Man, Robin Hardy’s horror classic. Andy Serkis and Jonathan Cavendish’s The Imaginarium and Urban Myth are producing.
