AP/Joel Ryan
The BBC is producing a television drama about blockbuster video game series Grand Theft Auto, which was originally developed in the
Now, The Hollywood Reporter has new information on who is involved with the show, and what it's going to focus on.
The drama will apparently cover the high-profile fight between Rockstar Games creator Sam Houser and Miami lawyer Jack Thompson, who repeatedly tried to ban violent video games.
The report says Actor Daniel Radcliffe is in talks to play lead character Sam Houser, and the show will be directed by Owen Harris. The script is being written by James Wood, and shooting is scheduled to begin on April 20.
The show's screenplay will be adapted from a popular book about the Grand Theft Auto Series, "Jacked" by writer David Kushner. The book covers the development of the games, as well as the controversy that Grand Theft Auto encountered due to its violent content. "Jacked" also explains the "Hot Coffee" incident, which caused international outrage when a Grand Theft Auto game was found to include a secret sex minigame.
Here's the BBC's original statement on the Grand Theft Auto drama:
Unlike many coding success stories, Grant [sic] Theft Auto was not created in Silicon Valley - it was the brainchild of a bunch of British gaming geniuses who had known each other since their school days. In autumn 2013 its latest iteration - GTA:V - earned $1bn in its first three days, becoming the fastest selling entertainment product in history.
GTA offered gamers the chance to step into a fantasy world where they could behave like criminals, gun down rival gangsters and cops, hijack cars and venture deeper into an imaginary American gangland underworld.
But the violent gameplay coupled with its outstanding success led to fierce opposition: from parents worried about children immersing themselves in such a violent world; from politicians, alarmed at the values it encourages; and above all from moral-campaigners, who have fought passionately to stop it.
Grand Theft Auto tells the story of how the game was conceived and created and the subsequent fallout as various groups objected to its violent gameplay.