It’s been two months since Dwayne Johnson teamed up with Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds in Red Notice, which became Netflix’s most-watched movie on both its debut day and within its first 28 days of availability. The trio is set to reunite for two more sequels, but in the meantime, Johnson has a different kind of rose-colored movie in the works. The Rock will star in a Christmas-set action movie called Red One, and it’s been revealed that Marvel Cinematic Universe star Chris Evans will be joining him for this Amazon Studios ride.
With plot details still being kept secret, there’s no information from Deadline on how the Captain America actor fits into the Red One picture. Regardless, Chris Evans is the first actor announced to be co-starring alongside Dwayne Johnson in the streaming feature that comes from an original story by Hiram Garcia, who co-founded and co-runs Seven Bucks Productions with Johnson. Although Johnson and Evans both cameoed in the Ryan Reynolds-led Free Guy last year, this will mark the first time they’re headlining a movie together.
From 2011 to 2019, Chris Evans starred as Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, in the MCU, with his tenure wrapping up in Avengers: Endgame. While it was rumored in early 2021 that the actor might return to the superhero franchise, between both Evans and Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige debunking that rumor and Captain America 4 seeing Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson take center stage, we shouldn’t be expecting that… for now.
Chris Evans’ other recent credits include The Red Sea Diving Resort, Knives Out and the Apple TV+ miniseries Defending Jacob. In addition to Red One, he’s also co-starring alongside Ryan Gosling and Ana de Armas in Netflix’s The Gray Man, voicing Buzz Lightyear in Pixar’s Lightyear, set to make his movie musical debut in the Little Shop of Horrors remake and will play Gene Kelly in a biopic, the latter of which he’s also producing.
Jake Kasdan, who previously teamed with Dwayne Johnson on the most recent Jumanji movies, is sitting in the Red One director’s chair, while Chris Morgan, who’s written all of the Fast & Furious movies Johnson’s appeared in (as well as 2009’s Fast & Furious) penned the screenplay. Kasdan and Morgan are also attached to Red One as producers, and production is set to begin later this year.
Again, we don’t know specifically what’s in store for Dwayne Johnson in Red One yet, although Hiram Garcia did clarify that the WWE icon will not be playing Santa Claus. The producer also described the “globe-trotting” Red One as tonally being like “Hobbs & Shaw meets Guardians of the Galaxy meets Miracle on 34th Street,” and will turn a lot of tropes and mythological elements surrounding Christmas “on their head.” The Amazon feature doesn’t have a specific release date yet, but Johnson has said it’ll arrive during the 2023 holiday season.
As soon as more details about Red One come in, we’ll pass them along. In the meantime, Dwayne Johnson will debut as the DC Extended Universe’s version of Black Adam on July 29 (just one of The Rock's many upcoming movies), and we can expect to see Chris Evans in The Gray Man later this year too. Our 2022 release schedule is available for those of you curious about what other cinematic entertainment is on the horizon.
