Bryan Singer is in talks to direct Bohemian Rhapsody, the long-in-the-works movie about the seminal British rock band Queen, with Mr. Robot‘s Rami Malek playing frontman Freddie Mercury. The film is coming back together and is on the fast track at 2oth Century Fox and New Regency with original producer Graham King and his GK Films.

Fox and New Regency have stepped up for the joint project in the latest maneuver for a movie that has been in development with King for eight years. The most recent script, which focuses on the band and its iconic lead singer, is from The Theory Of Everything scribe Anthony McCarten. King and Jim Beach are producers, and Denis O’Sullivan is exec producer. Original Queen bandmembers Brian May and Roger Taylor will serve as music producers. [Source]

Mr. Robot star Rami Malek is negotiating to star with Charlie Hunnam in Papillon, a remake of the classic 1973 film. Hunnam will play the role originated by Steve McQueen, and Malek is in talks to play the Dustin Hoffman role. The film will shoot in September, directed by Michael Noer (Northwest) from a script by Prisoners writer Aaron Guzikowski. The picture is backed by Red Granite, and Joey McFarland, Riza Aziz, David Koplan, Ram Bergman and Roger Corbi are producing.

The film is a contemporary retelling of the original, which was based on the memoirs of convicted felon and fugitive Henri Charriere. He was a petty criminal from the Parisian underworld who was unjustly convicted of murder in 1930s France. He staged an epic escape from Devil’s Island, a notorious penal colony in French Guiana in South America, aided by quirky counterfeiter Louis Dega. That’s the role Malek will play. Their relationship starts with Charriere providing protection for Dega from fellow thug inmates and grows into a bond, then Degas agrees to finance Papillon’s prison escape. [Source]