Though they seem like wildly different filmmakers, one a sentimentalist with massive box office success and one a clinical auteur skilled in alienating audiences, Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick clearly shared a connection. That resulted, of course, in 2001's A.I., which Spielberg directed based on a script that Kubrick had been developing for decades. But even though Kubrick died in 1999, it's not too late for the two of them to collaborate one more time.
As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, Spielberg is planning to revive a script that Kubrick wrote in 1961 as a biopic about the French ruler Napoleon. Spielberg's version will become a miniseries, but he's not revealing where the series will land or how long it will be. Kubrick spent years researching the notorious emperor's life, and at one point even asked Oskar Werner and Audrey Hepburn to take part in it. Who knows if Spielberg can manage to drawn in similar caliber modern actors for the part, but his is a name that can draw people in to just about anything.
Previous Spielberg miniseries like The Pacific and Into the West have been modest but significant hits, and it's hard to imagine one about Napoleon really being the one to break that mold. But the Kubrick connection ought to get the interest of cinephiles, and as Spielberg waits to move forward on Robopocalypse and plans his May vacation in France, this seems as worthy a project as any of the hundreds of others that come his way.
