First One Direction, now Japanese group PrizmaX: boy bands are proving fertile recruiting grounds for some of the best directors in the business. Hot on the heels of Harry Styles in Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk is news that Steven Spielberg is tapping up PrizmaX lead singer Win Morisaki for his new sci-fi Ready Player One.
The Japanese actor and boy-bander will play a character called Daito in Spielberg’s adaptation of Ernest Cline’s book. Scouring the virtual world of Oasis for eggs that contain the keys to a riches beyond imagining, all with the help of a partner named Shoto.
If you’re read Ernest Cline's book, you’ll be well-versed in the mythology of this avatar-piloted world. If not, imagine Second Life by way of Minority Report in which the original co-creator of Oasis (Mark Rylance's James Halliday) dies, leaving his fortune and control of Oasis to anyone who can complete a fiendishly tough Easter egg hunt. It could be the opportunity teenager Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) has been waiting for, provided he, and his avatar Parzival, can negotiate the layers of villainy that await them.
Alongside Morisaki, Reliance and Sheridan, Spielberg has Olivia Cooke, Simon Pegg, Ben Mendelsohn and the recently-announced T.J. Miller aboard.
With filming set to get underway this summer, Ready Player One will be out on March 30, 2018.