Paul Greengrass is set to direct The Wolf of Wall Street stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Jonah Hill in a fact-based terrorist thriller set during the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, according to Deadline. Both actors were Oscar-nominated for their work in Martin Scorsese’s financial drama earlier this year, and are aiming to reunite on the project.
Hill is to be cast in the role of security guard Richard Jewell, who discovered a backpack filled with pipe bombs inside the Olympic park in July 1996 and proceeded to evacuate the area. In the immediate wake of the discovery, however, he was vilified by the media and investigated by the FBI as the suspected “lone bomber”. Eventually exonerated, Jewell died from natural causes in 2007.
The as-yet-untitled Fox production is based on American Nightmare: The Ballad of Richard Jewell, a 1997 Vanity Fair article by Marie Brenner, and has been scripted by Billy Ray, who previously collaborated with Greengrass on the contemporary piracy drama Captain Phillips. DiCaprio will co-star as Jewell’s southern attorney.
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