Baby Driver’s Ansel Elgort to star in a different kind of musical as the lead in Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story

[News]

After his breakthrough turn in Edgar Wright’s wonderful Baby Driver, rising actor Ansel Elgort is likely faced with no shortage of upcoming projects. He’s got the highly anticipated adaptation of Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch on the docket, and he’s now secured a high-profile follow-up in Steven Spielberg’s upcoming West Side Story remake. It makes sense, we suppose, as Baby Driver was just one step away from being a full-blown musical.

Elgort will star as Tony, the one-time gang member who falls in love with Maria, the sister of the leader of his old crew’s rival gang. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Spielberg and his team chose Elgort after a casting search that looked at thousands of actors and dancers, an approach that many thought would lead to Spielberg casting an unknown.

(Read: Ranking Every Steven Spielberg Movie from Worst to Best)

Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tony Kushner, who wrote Spielberg’s Munich, penned the adaptation, which is slated to begin production in the summer of 2019. Spielberg is also at work on Indiana Jones 5 and an adaptation of DC Comics’ Blackhawk.

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