Steve Jobs. AP FILE PHOTO
SAN FRANCISCO—Sony Pictures Entertainment on Wednesday said that the Academy Award winning screenwriter behind “The Social Network” will write the script for a film about Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.
Aaron Sorkin will adapt the hot-selling biography by journalist Walter Isaacson for the motion picture screen, according to Sony.
“Steve Jobs’s story is unique: he was one of the most revolutionary and influential men not just of our time but of all time,” Sony Pictures co-chair Amy Pascal said in a release.
“There is no writer working in Hollywood today who is more capable of capturing such an extraordinary life for the screen than Aaron Sorkin; in his hands, we’re confident that the film will be everything that Jobs himself was: captivating, entertaining, and polarizing.”
The project is being produced by Mark Gordon, Scott Rudin, and Guymon Casady, according to Pascal and Columbia Pictures president Doug Belgrad.
Isaacson’s book titled simply “Steve Jobs” has sold more than two million copies since its release late last year and was the top-selling title at online retail powerhouse Amazon.com, according to industry statistics cited by Sony.
Sorkin won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for “The Social Network,” a blockbuster film based on Mark Zuckerberg launching what is now Facebook in his Harvard dorm room.
Sorkin’s other works include “A Few Good Men” and “Moneyball.” He has also acquired the rights to The Politician, a book by author Andrew Young about the downfall of former US senator John Edwards.
Sorkin will make his directing debut with a film based on his adaptation of the book for the screen, according to Sony.
Ashton Kutcher is to play Jobs in a new independent film about the late Apple chief’s life, a spokeswoman for the “Two and a Half Men” actor said in April.
“Jobs” will tell the story of his life from wayward hippie to co-founder of Apple and revered creative entrepreneur, according the spokeswoman.
Twitter trailblazer Kutcher, who recently split from actress Demi Moore, is attached to the project to be directed by Joshua Michael Stern based on a script by Matt Whiteley, it said.
Production was due to start this month while Kutcher is taking a break from “Two and a Half Men,” the hit TV series he joined last year after Charlie Sheen was sacked following a very public row with the producer.
Kutcher, 34, was best known for TV shows including “That 70s Show” and “Punk’d” before he replaced Sheen last May. He and Moore, both Twitter early adopters, announced their separation in November.