Danny Ocean is getting ready to reunite the gang for another caper.the
Deadline is reporting that a new installment of the popular Ocean’s series of caper films is moving forward in development with studio Warner Brothers courting All Quiet On The Western Front director Edward Berger to take the directorial reins from Steven Soderbergh.
Series stars George Clooney and Brad Pitt are reportedly already on board for this new installment. No word as to whether the rest of the original cast will be back, though their ranks will be somewhat diminished due to the passing of Bernie Mac and Carl Reiner.
Clooney has stated in the past that the script they have for the project is in the vein of the 1979 comedy Going In Style. That film starred George Burns, Art Carney, Lee Strasberg as three senior citizens who decide to rob a bank in order to relieve the tedium of their lives.
Berger, whose All Quiet On The Western front won four Academy Awards including Best International Feature, had his latest film, Conclave, open at the Telluride Film Festival this week.
The current Ocean’s franchise started off as a remake of the 1960 film that starred Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and a host of their showbiz friends, solidifying the group under the umbrella name of “the Rat Pack.”
It is unknown if another Ocean’s project, a 1960s-set story being developed for Warner Brothers by Margot Robbie’s production company Lucky Chap with director Jay Roach, is still being considered by the studio.
While the prospect of spending another two hours hanging out with Danny Ocean and his gang as they commit a new caper is intriguing, it also does seem to rule out a separate sequel to 2018’s Ocean’s Eight, which starred Sandra Bullock as Debbie Ocean, the younger sister of Clooney’s Danny Ocean who forms her own gang to pull off a heist at the annual Met Gala. It was a fun enough film and earning almost $300 million at the global box office against a $70 million budget, making it the second biggest moneymaker in the franchise after the original 2001 Ocean’s Eleven. Perhaps the new film will see Danny bringing a few of Debbie’s crew to round out his gang for whatever caper he is planning. (Of course, he’ll have to explain to Debbie why he isn’t dead as she believed he was in Ocean’s Eight.)
