Chris Pine "Not Too Nervous" About Playing Jack Ryan in Upcoming Reboot
Posted 02.23.12 by Ryan
Chris Pine's meteoric rise to fame started with 2009's Star Trek (sorry, Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement fans), with Pine stepping into the iconic role of Captain Kirk. Pine took a step backward with This Means War, the recently released romantic comedy that received lousy reviews and failed to impress at the box office.
Still, with Pine currently shooting Star Trek 2 (working title), the actor has little cause for concern. Despite the fact that his non-Star Trek efforts, This Means War and 2010's Unstoppable, have failed to become massive successes, Pine has already lined up another potential franchise. He will be taking over the role of CIA analyst Jack Ryan in an untitled reboot — the first movie to feature the Tom Clancy character since 2002's The Sum of All Fears.
In an interview with Australia's Adelaide Now, Pine admitted he's "not too nervous" about playing Ryan after already successfully playing James T. Kirk.
Not to take anything away from Harrison Ford or Alec Baldwin or Ben Affleck, but I don't think Jack Ryan is as iconic as Captain Kirk — who was William Shatner. Jack Ryan has been inhabited now by many different guys — so I am not too nervous.
The task ahead of us now is to make an international spy movie in the post-9/11 era. It's not going to be a Cold War Jack Ryan.
Known to be a priority for Paramount, we're not sure where progress stands on the Untitled Jack Ryan movie. Jack Bender (ABC's Lost) was attached to direct last March, and the latest we've heard about the movie is that the studio hired screenwriter David Koepp (Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible) last April to rewrite the script. The reboot will supposedly follow Ryan at the beginning of his career when he survived a terrible helicopter crash as a platoon leader in the US Marines.
Before either of Pine's franchises reach theaters, Pine will likely appear next in the indie drama, Welcome to People. Directed by his Star Trek co-writer Alex Kurtzman, the movie is still without a release date. "It's a film about a young man who, in coming home to bury his father, finds out he had a secret second family. I'm very proud of it," said Pine.
With Pine becoming the face of two franchises, it looks like the actor's career is going nowhere but up. Pine's former agency agrees, and is suing the actor for commissions since landing the role of Kirk. Who said it was easy being famous?
Next Showing: This Means War is currently in theaters