Johnny Depp was riding high on the success of his “Pirates of the Caribbean” when another “almost perfect” project began withering on the vine.
It was 2007, and all 12,000 Hollywood film and TV writers were on strike.
With other big films in his pipeline, Depp was added to star in “Shantaram”, about a former bank-robbing heroin addict who escapes from an Australian prison and lands in India, where he Struggles to start an anonymous life in urban chaos. Bombay in the 1980s.
Warner Bros. purchased the rights to the international bestselling novel of the same name in 2004, a year after it was published. A screenplay was written by the writer, Gregory David Roberts.
But as Jack Sparrow said, “If you were waiting for the opportune moment, that was it.”
Roberts then served as the first domino to fall into nearly 20 years of development and production of “Shantaram,” a massive epic that Apple, Paramount TV, and “Sons of Anarchy” star Charlie Hunnam would eventually finish, but As a revamped TV series .
Emerging writer-director Eli Roth replaced Roberts and delivered a rewrite that anchored Shantaram for a decade. Peter Weir, of “Dead Poets Society” and “The Truman Show” fame, was directed in 2005 prior to creative differences leading to their involvement.
Two years later, when Indian American director Mira Nair was brought in, Depp remained publicly confident in the project. But cracks were visible.
‘We have paused for a moment’
“What’s up with the writers’ strike and everything, we’ve basically put the film on pause,” Depp said in a 2007 interview with India’s NDTV, when they promoted “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” directed by Tim Burton, six months after the release of “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End,” the third installment of the Disney franchise.
“We’ve hit pause for the moment, to see how everything goes with the writers’ strike,” Depp said. “Meera’s work with Eric Roth has been amazing. And I think they’re getting very close to something, almost perfect. But with writers’ strike, you need to make sure everything is there—you’ve got all your ducks in a row.”
When asked if the film would be shot on location in Bombay, Depp said, “There would be no place to do that.”
“It should be in that area, in Bombay, and I think there’s no one better than Mira who can hold it,” Depp said. “She has a real strong feel to the place, obviously.”
Nair, who called it “a piece of my heart”, then fell for “Shantaram”, later stating that the script was brilliant and “kind of ready to go”, but after Depp had done other work. This project was demolished. Hollywood writers strike. For Depp, “Public Enemy” (2009), “Alice in Wonderland” (2010), “The Tourist” (2010), the fourth “Pirates” film (2011) and his second Hunter S. Thompson Passion Project, “The Rum Diary” (2011), awaited.
But “Shantaram” was not dead. With Warner Bros. still holding the rights for which they paid $2 million, Joel Edgerton was enlisted to play the lead role of Dale Conti, aka Lynn Ford, in 2013, with Depp in the production. had returned. Or at least, Edgerton entered talks for the film, which still needed a director.
Enter Charlie Hunnam, Paramount Television and Apple
Like millions of others, reading “Shantaram” made an impression on British actor Charlie Hunnam. While vacationing in Thailand, he “ate up” all 936 pages, and amid the uncertainty of the film project, he was convinced it was better suited as a TV series.
As fate would have it, and as Hunnam put it, “After many great efforts, Warner Bros. threw in the hat and the rights became available.” Bids were invited in 2018. And after a month-long process, Paramount and Anonymous Content soon acquired Shantaram, joining the project.
His intention was to turn it into a TV series.
“I think because of the length and complexity of the story, it’s really impossible to reduce it to two hours,” Hunnam said. EW. in an interview with,
Meanwhile, Hunnam was ripe for an opportunity that could build on the success he had with the FX hit series “Sons of Anarchy,” which ended after seven seasons in 2014. He had since starred in “The Lost City of Jade”, “King Arthur: Legend of the Sword” and “The Gentlemen”, among other films, but no one has achieved the same level as biker outlaw Jacques Taylor for Hunnam. Brave and did not sign. ,
“Ultimately stories want to be told, and they can be told with different people at different times,” Hunnam told EW. “I didn’t necessarily feel that it was my role and I’m the only one who could play it anyway. It’s an amazing role and an amazing story, and there were a lot of people who would have done a wonderful job, but I’m very happy.” Feel grateful and lucky that I got a chance to bring this to life.”
Hunnam signed the lead role of “Shantaram” in September 2019.
But the challenges that had stung “Shantaram” during the course of development continued. Six months later – and a month before much of the world went into COVID-19 lockdown – production halted to give showrunner, writer and producer Eric Warren Singer (“American Hustle”) more time to write the script. Steven Lightfoot (“The Punisher”) was also brought in to lend the production TV experience.
By November, Singer was out, and Lightfoot was in. Shooting locations originally set for India and Australia were also reconfigured in mid-2001, with India engulfed by a huge wave of COVID infections and deaths.
With some shooting in Australia, Hunnam will now be returning to Thailand – ground zero of his “Shantaram” inspiration.
Critical welcome for “Shantaram”
TV critics had decidedly mixed views with “Shantaram”. giving rotten tomatoes 55% out of 20 reviews as of Tuesday.
from them:
- The Hollywood Reporter called it A show that “has the unbearable trappings of another white savior story about a damaged man whose quest for self-realization takes him to a foreign place where superficial lessons about a previously unknown spiritual system help him and the original literally no one else around him.”
- RogerEbert.com says it was “Best Apple TV+ fare” but “a lot to get through, and a little bloated as a result.” On a positive note, the series “captures the spirit of its source material, albeit a slightly sprawling package.”
- The Guardian disbanded it as “A bit of a thriller, with a moral lesson, though its main moral is that if there’s any chance for star Charlie Hunnam to negotiate after taking off his top, or in the process of pulling it off, then yes, he will. “
- San Francisco Chronicle says “There is nothing harsh or stuffy about ‘Shantaram’, but the quality is high enough that it qualifies as prestige television, a term that gets harder to define day by day.”
- Variety was also not affected: “Often on ‘Shantaram’, Bombay is, first and foremost, the site of Lynn’s romantic pursuits or personal growth. And it is a city with so many stories to tell, which consumes all that oxygen.”
Three “Shantaram” episodes are available to stream now, with Apple TV+ rolling out nine consecutive Fridays through December.
