'Departed' Scribe Sets Sail with 'The Essex'
Let's journey back to the War of 1812
William Monahan, the man who wrote films such as The Departed, Body of Lies and the upcoming Mel Gibson drama Edge of Darkness, is currently set to direct Colin Farrell and Keira Knightley in London Boulevard from another script he wrote, which will mark his directorial debut and it appears he may have found his follow-up.
Variety reports Monahan may direct The Essex, an historical drama about Capt. David S. Porter and his daring sea battles against the British during the War of 1812, from a script he wrote for Graham King's GK Films.
The film will be set at a time when the ships of the British Royal Navy heavily outnumbered the American naval fleet, and Porter steered the Essex past British cruisers to reach the Pacific, where it devastated the British whaling fleet before engaging in a final battle with a special Brit squadron.
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Monahan actually had already written a script about Captain David S. Porter way back in 1994. In his New York Press article "Whale's Jaw" he takes a few paragraphs to talk about Captain Porter and writes at one point, "While [Porter] was ashore on Nuku Hiva, he not only fought a bloody high-cinema war with the warlike Typees, he annexed the island, and committed the first act of extraterritorial American imperialism. Don't even think of writing the screenplay. I've got it registered."
He goes on for several more paragraphs about Porter's adventures in "Whale's Jaw". Should be an awesome film. BTW, if you want to check out Monahan's masterpiece about New York Press read Dining Late with Claude La Badarian (serialized in 2001). It's awesome.
Please let this film come to pass. As long as it can live up to the fantastic portrayal of naval life that was "Master & Commander," I'm completely sold. The writer of The Departed? He can direct anything as far as I'm concerned.