Jacob Elordi is taking on one of the darkest true stories in American letters. The Oscar-nominated actor will star in and produce a feature adaptation of Norman Mailer's The Executioner's Song for Scott Stuber's United Artists, The Playlist reported, citing Deadline.
Elordi is set to play Gary Gilmore, the convicted murderer at the center of Mailer's book. No director or screenwriter has been announced.
A Pulitzer-winning story returns to the screen
Mailer's 1979 book won the Pulitzer Prize and follows Gilmore's life after his release from prison, the two murders he committed in Utah in 1976 and his insistence on being executed for them. Gilmore died by firing squad on Jan. 17, 1977, at Utah State Prison, becoming the first person executed in the United States in about a decade and the first after the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the death penalty to resume.
The story was adapted once before, as a 1982 television film starring Tommy Lee Jones as Gilmore, with Christine Lahti, Rosanna Arquette and Eli Wallach. Mailer wrote that screenplay.
The project marks another heavy dramatic turn for Elordi, who earned a best supporting actor Oscar nomination for Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein. Cup of Soul called that performance one the world wasn't ready for in our early look at Frankenstein.
Elordi has also led Ridley Scott's post-apocalyptic film The Dog Stars and wrapped the final season of HBO's Euphoria earlier this year.
For Stuber's United Artists, landing one of Hollywood's most in-demand young stars for a prestige literary adaptation is a statement of intent. With the source material's built-in acclaim and Elordi's recent run, expect a lot of interest in who steps in to write and direct.
No production start or release date has been set.
