Things change pretty fast in the financial world, as anyone watching the news over the several weeks should know. Among the many casualties of the recent economic downturn is the screenplay for 20th Century Fox’s Wall Street sequel that was being worked on by scripter Stanley Weiser. In an interview with at Ropes Of Silicon, Weiser briefly talks about what his take on the continuing story of Gordon Gekko would have been and why we won’t be seeing it at a theater near you.

Here’s what happened. I was working on the script and the latter part was set in China and dealing with Chinese money and policing the Chinese. Gekko gets out of jail. It actually opened with Gekko getting out of jail and he’s standing by a curb and a limo pulls up and he’s next to a black kid, who’s a prisoner, and the black kid gets in the limo. The black kid is a rapper and the limo is for the rapper. So he is left standing there on the street alone and no one knows who he is anymore.

Basically, he had gone to Europe, like this world trader Marc Rich. He had been making deals in Europe and then he decided he wanted to go back to New York and get back in the action. So he does his jail time.

To make a long story short. I wrote the screenplay and Fox put it in turnaround because it was dated. Everything has changed and they’re starting with a page one rewrite that deals with the current situation in the markets. So it won’t be ready for a year and by that time the economy will have changed again so I wouldn’t be too hopeful.

As we have reported, Fox has already hired Alan Loeb to work up a new story treatment for theproposed sequel. Previously, Stephen Schiff had been working with producer Ed Pressman on a script. But is Weiser correct? Will the producers of this film ever be ahead of the curve enough to be able to reflect the reality of the economy at the time the movie hits the screens?

Producer Ed Pressman is continuing to push forward with his plans to make a sequel to the 1987 cautionary tale Wall Street.

Variety is reporting that Pressman has hired 21 scribe Alan Loeb to pen the screenplay. In addition to writing, Loeb just happens to be a licensed stockbroker who formerly worked at the Chicago Board of Trade.

This is a change from the report we ran over a year ago indicating that Pressman was developing the sequel with writer Stephen Schiff. The basic premise of both reports sounds the same- Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas, from the original film) emerges from a stretch in prison to discover that the financial world is much different in nature from when he ruled it two decades ago. There’s no word if Loeb’s script is a rewrite of Schiff’s work or if it goes off on its own direction.

Although Douglas is not formally attached to the project, Variety is reporting that 20th Century Fox has fast-tracked the project’s development, no doubt in part spurred on by recent headlines. It’s nice to see that someone looks like they have a plain to make some money from this economic downturn.

Gordon Gecko, the slick inside trader/anti-hero of Oliver Stone’s Wall Street (1987) may be gracing cinema screens once again, according to an interview with the film’s producer Ed Pressman in the West Australian.

Pressman has been working with screenwriter Stephen Schiff in developing a story that not only returns the character to the big screen, but reflects the changes in world business that have occurred over the last quarter century. He said-

Wall Street was New York-centric. Today the markets are much more global, hence the title of the new film, Money Never Sleeps… The new film will be based in New York, in London, in the United Arab Emirates and in an Asian country. We’ve pretty well worked out the inter-personal relationships between the characters. We’re now talking about the business events.

Portrayed by Michael Douglas, Gecko embodied all that director Oliver Stone saw as wrong in corporate America. Of course, Gecko’s over-the-top ambition and drive didn’t stop him from becoming a hero to many. As Pressman explains-

That’s his appeal. Gekko is larger than life. His appetites are large. The audience enjoys a vicarious pleasure of seeing a world they would never be part of. In a funny way Wall Street was like The Godfather in that the real mob began dressing and behaving like characters in the movie. After Wall Street people started wearing suspenders (braces) like Michael.

And what has happened to Gecko since audiences last saw him being betrayed by his protégé Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) to rival Sir Larry Wildman (Terence Stamp)? Pressman reveals that much like real life trader Michael Milkin, whom the character of Gecko is partly based on, Gecko has done a stretch in prison for his illegal activities, but upon release has donated much time and money to charity work. Pressman hints, though, “a leopard doesn’t change its spots, despite appearances.”

Via Film Ick.