Donald Sutherland Joins James Gray's 'Ad Astra' (Exclusive)

Donald Sutherland is heading into orbit for New Regency's Ad Astra, James Gray's upcoming sci-fi epic.

Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones and Ruth Negga also are attached to the project, which is described as an adventure film about one man’s (Pitt) journey across a lawless and unforgiving solar system to find his missing father, a renegade scientist who poses a threat to all of mankind.

Gray will direct the feature film from a script he co-wrote with Ethan Gross. New Regency, 20th Century Fox and Bona Film Group are financing the pic. Fox will distribute in the U.S. and internationally in every market except Greater China, where Bona Film Group will distribute.

Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner are producing under their Plan B banner with RT Features’ Rodrigo Teixeira, Keep Your Head Productions’ Anthony Katagas and Gray. Mad River’s Marc Butan and RT Features’ Lourenco Sant’Anna and Sophie Mas are executive producing along with Yu Dong, Jeffrey Chan, Anthony Mosawi and Paul Conway. 

Ad Astra continues a string of successful film partnerships between New Regency and Plan B, including the Oscar-nominated The Big Short and Oscar winner 12 Years a Slave, as well as director Ryan Coogler's upcoming feature Wrong Answer, written by Ta-Nehisi Coates and starring Michael B. Jordan.

RT Features produced both Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me by Your Name starring Armie Hammer which Sony Pictures Classics is releasing and Geremy Jasper’s Patti Cake$, which Fox Searchlight is releasing Aug. 18.

Two-time Golden Globe winner Sutherland, who played the villainous President Snow in the Hunger Games franchise, will soon be seen in Sony Pictures Classics' The Leisure Seeker with Helen Mirren, which will premiere at the Toronto Film Festival. He also will star as J. Paul Getty in Trust, the television limited series from director Danny Boyle. He is repped by CAA.