EXCLUSIVE: Focus Features has acquired worldwide rights to Oscar-winning filmmaker Brian Helgeland’s Outside Man. Deadline first told you about the Teton Ridge Entertainment production back in April that stars Ice Cube and Oscar winner Tommy Lee Jones. Cameras will roll on the movie in November.
The project reteams Oscar-winning L.A. Confidential co-scribe Helgeland with his Finestkind actor Jones.
Helgeland wrote and directs Outside Man, which follows former Chicago mob enforcer Ruben Bowman (Ice Cube). After Ruben is released from prison, he is a man intent on changing his life. Disappearing into rural Texas, he finds work under a skilled furniture craftsman and a retired Texas Ranger, Gus Wanamaker (Jones). As Ruben and Gus form an unlikely friendship, the bond is jeopardized when both men’s pasts threaten to catch up with them.
Pic is produced by Jillian Share and Jen Gorton of Teton Ridge, Ice Cube and Jeff Kwatinetz of Cube Vision, and Bill Gerber. Executive producers are Helgeland, Justin Bursch, Madeleine Moore for Teton Ridge and Ben Hurwitz for Cube Vision.
Focus notched its highest-grossing movie ever this year in Curry Barker’s Obsession, which grossed in excess of a half-billion dollars at the global box office. Upcoming for the label is Robert Eggers’ Werwulf on Christmas Day; Elsinore from Simon Stone, starring Andrew Scott; Georgia Oakley’s fresh take on Jane Austen’s classic Sense and Sensibility; Sarah Polley’s The Bell Jar starring Billie Eilish in her debut feature role; as well as Barker’s next big-screen horror feature Anything But Ghosts in early May 2027.
Teton Ridge Entertainment’s mission is creating TV and film projects celebrating the spirit of the American West. The company recently received a full-series order from Netflix for Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry’s Pulitzer Prize-winning epic, with East of Eden’s Zoe Kazan and Jeb Stuart set to adapt. Other high-profile iconic Western IP acquisitions for the production label include High Noon, from filmmaker Stanley Kramer; Louis L’Amour’s beloved bestseller Fallon; and the life rights of Oscar-winning actor John Wayne.
CubeVision has produced the Oscar-nominated and box office hit Straight Outta Compton ($201.6 million in worldwide box office), along with many franchises that include Friday, Barbershop, Are We There Yet? and Ride Along, and many other films. Upcoming projects include Ride Along 3 at Universal, Are They Gone Yet? at Skydance Sports, Sony’s upcoming 24 Jump Street and Last Friday at Skydance. In total, Ice Cube and CubeVision films have grossed more than $1 billion at the box office.
Helgeland is represented by WME and Jackoway Austen Tyerman. Ice Cube is represented by Johnson, Shapiro, Slewett & Kole and UTA. Jones is represented by CAA and Jacobson, Russell, Saltz, Nassim & De La Torre.
English (US) ·