Aaron Sorkin to Write 'Steve Jobs' Movie for Sony

It’s official: Aaron Sorkin, the Oscar-winning screenwriter behind The Social Network, A Few Good Men and TV’s The West Wing, has signed on to adapt Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson’s biography on the late Apple co-founder.  

our editor recommends

'True Blood,' Aaron Sorkin's 'The Newsroom' June Premiere Dates Announced

Mark Gordon, Scott Rudin and Guymon Casady are producing the project.

Sony reportedly paid $1 million for the rights to the biography, picking it up in October. The book was Amazon’s best-selling title of 2011 and, according to Publisher’s Weekly, 2.2 million copies were sold last year.

Said Sony Pictures Entertainment co-chairman Amy Pascal in a statement: “Steve Jobs’ story is unique: he was one of the most revolutionary and influential men not just of our time but of all time. There is no writer working in Hollywood today who is more capable of capturing such an extraordinary life for the screen than Aaron Sorkin; in his hands, we’re confident that the film will be everything that Jobs himself was: captivating, entertaining and polarizing."

Sorkin was the studio’s choice almost from the very beginning, with Sony approaching the writer as early as November. At the time, he said was “strongly considering” taking on the assignment.

Sorkin won a best adapted screenplay Oscar for 2010's The Social Network, which tackled the rise of tech giant Facebook. He shared an Oscar nomination with Steve Zaillian and Stan Chervin this year for Moneyball, about baseball manager Billy Beane’s use of computer-generated stats to construct a winning baseball team. Both those films were released by Sony.

Steve Jobs is the second biopic on the tech genius in the works. Inferno Entertainment is selling Jobs, expected to be one of the hit titles in Cannes. That project, an indie with a budget of around $5 million, stars Ashton Kutcher.
 
By only setting a scribe now, Sony is clearly in no rush with its project, believing that pedigree will be one of its distinguishing factors.

Email: Borys.Kit@thr.com

Twitter: @Borys_Kit