Methuselah is one of those concepts – we can't even really call it a movie yet – that wanders around echoing studio halls waiting for a door to open. It has seen several filmmakers and actors (including Tom Cruise) interested through the years, but scored a positive boost when Michael B. Jordan signed on last year. It looks like it also finally has a director, with Danny Boyle making a deal with Warner Bros. to bring it to life.
Yet this is far from the final step on the film's journey. Born as a treatment by James Watkins, the basic idea focused on a man who has lived for hundreds of years without showing signs of aging, picking up a vast array of skills along the way. Tony Gilroy wrote the most recent draft of the script, but it now appears that Boyle will bring occasional collaborator Simon Beaufoy aboard to take a new approach with the plot.
This would make Boyle's return to franchise-potential territory, and is a little surprising given that following his less-than-fulfilling stint with No Time To Die, he's thrown himself into the likes of Yesterday. Still, if Beaufoy does come aboard, the pair could do something different with the new movie.