Los Angeles, Oct 1: Writer-director Guy Guido is planning to make a feature film on the personal life of the legendary Hollywood star James Dean.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the movie will be based on Dean’s 2006 memoir Surviving James Dean by William Bast.
Guido — known for Madonna and the Breakfast Club and Lovin’ Brooklyn, has already written the script.
He is currently in talks with the potential producers for the movie and is in the process of casting actors for the project.
Bast wrote the book describing his experience of meeting Dean, who starred in only three films East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, and Giant as a hero, at the UCLA theater program at the age of 19. In his account, the author said they soon became roommates, close friends and eventually lovers.
In the book, the writer — who died in 2015 at age 84 — also described how both of them kept their romance away from the public so as not to interfere with the image of the actor, who was riding on the success of his career.
Dean died five years after meeting Bast in a car accident in 1955 at the age of 24. Two of his signature films, Rebel Without a Cause and Giant, released posthumously. Guido has set his script from the first meeting between Bast and Dean to the actor’s death on September 30, 1955.
The film will focus on the duo navigating their evolving relationship and Bast coming to terms with being gay during the 1950s.
“I have been a fan and historian of James Dean since I was 18 years old, so I knew about his ‘friend’ Willie, even when information about their relationship was straight-washed by the Hollywood machine.
“As a filmmaker, I love telling the story of a celebrity’s life in their coming-of-age period. As a gay man, I was particularly drawn to Bast’s unique story. I am obsessed with getting the look right when it comes to casting and directing a film about a famous person. I want people to feel as if they are watching the real James Dean on the screen,” Guido said.
Previously, the 2001 film James Dean explored the late actor’s life. James Franco portrayed the title role in the movie directed by Mark Rydell.
