He spent nearly a decade trying to get the story of Stephen and Jane Hawking on screen and with **The Theory Of Everything **burning through awards season, it’s perhaps not surprising that writer/producer Anthony McCarten is seeing some movement on another dream project. Darkest Hour**, the story of a crucial moment in Winston Churchill’s life during the height of World War II, is now set up at Theory production company Working Title.
**Darkest Hour **is set in 1940, when Churchill was in his first days as Prime Minister. With Britain under serious threat from Germany and the tide looking likely to turn further, Churchill was under pressure to strike a deal with Hitler that would see Britain effectively become a Third Reich puppet stake. He wrestled with the decision and ultimately decided... Well, you know where history proceeds from here so no-one should be calling for a spoiler alert.
“We aim to present a Churchill you haven’t seen before, a new portrait that shows all his famous strengths but also adds new dimensions, such as the grave doubts he privately harboured, the dark moods that would seize him unexpectedly and his fear of failure, a driving force that is often is left out of any discussion of the man,” McCarten tells Deadline. The team will now be tracking down the right director and cast for the film. McCarten is also at work on the adaptation of Nick Davies’ book Hack Attack: The Inside Story Of How The Truth Caught Up With Rupert Murdoch for George Clooney.