Ready Player Two is still going ahead as a movie, but Steven Spielberg will be changing roles on the new movie.
After steering Ready Player One to a global box office take of over half a billion dollars, it was inevitable that when the potential of a movie based on Ready Player Two came along, Steven Spielberg would get first dibs on it.
Ready Player Two is – yeah, you probably guessed this – the sequel book to Ernest Cline’s original hit. It came out in 2020 and didn’t, er, get the most positive of reviews. Still, it was little secret that Warner Bros wants to do a sequel to the original movie and it soon snapped up the rights to do so.
News that a film adaptation was on the way first arose in 2020, with conversations originally taking place during the lengthy production of Ready Player One. Steven Spielberg remains involved in the new film too, although confirmation – not a surprising confirmation – arrived this week when he admitted he wouldn’t be directing the film. Instead, he’s going to sit in the producer chair for it.
Podcast: Ready Player One (2018) and Working Girl (1988)
It was part of a brief interview he gave to Showbiz 411, where Spielberg admitted that he didn’t have a film that he was set to shoot in 2024 at all. That said, he has a plethora of projects on the stove, but he’s in the midst of working out which of those he wants to commit to next.
Which leaves the director’s chair vacant on Ready Player Two for the time being. The fact that Spielberg has now confirmed he’s producing indicates that it’s still an active project, but against that, it’s unclear at the moment what state the script is in, and who’s likely to be returning for the next film. Plus, the biggest question of all: will it be returning to my beloved Birmingham again?
More as we hear it.
Read more: Ready Player One | Author Ernest Cline is bringing his novel to the metaverse
