The John Travolta 'Bosch' Movie We Never Got To See

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Bosch

The hit series Bosch, based on Michael Connelly'sHarry Bosch novels, made its television debut in 2015. The show has become a long-running, popular smash hit and a landmark for Prime Video's streaming lineup. While the sequel series, Bosch: Legacy, will conclude with its third season in 2025, the franchise will continue with a new television show featuring Detective Renee Ballard (Maggie Q). Titus Welliver proved to be an excellent casting choice as the grizzled, no-nonsense Hieronymous Bosch, but there was a time when an adaptation of Connelly's bestselling book series and character almost went in a completely different direction. In the 1990s, Hollywood was tossing around the second Harry Bosch novel, The Black Ice, but the project never got off the ground. This is a shame, since the actor who nearly portrayed Harry Bosch was none other thanJohn Travolta. It's time to explore the Harry Bosch movie we never got to see.

Michael Connelly's 'Harry Bosch' Books Were First Optioned in 1994

As reported by The Los Angeles Times in March 1994, Hollywood was looking to adapt Connelly's Harry Bosch books soon after they were published. At the time, producers Robert Rehme and Mace Neufeld initially optioned Connelly's first two books in the Bosch series, The Black Echo and The Black Ice, for Paramount Pictures. While the film rights were sold, The Black Ice film adaptation did not start to gain serious movement until some time later, around the year 2000.

Variety reported in January 2000 that scribe Scott Rosenberg was tapped to rewrite his earlier script of The Black Ice, with Neufeld still on board as a producer, in a lucrative $1.3 million deal. The Black Ice was expected to be filmed as a co-production between Sony's Columbia Pictures and Paramount. When the deal was made, Columbia Pictures was eyeing such prominent filmmakers as Oliver Stone, John Frankenheimer, and Steven Soderbergh to helm the picture.

John Travolta Nearly Portrayed Harry Bosch

Harry Bosch walking down the street in Bosch

In April 2001, Entertainment Weekly reported that actor John Travolta was considering his next project following Domestic Disturbance, Angry White Men for producer Joel Silver, and The Black Ice for Sony. Travolta seemed fairly positive regarding playing Harry Bosch, and he said about The Black Ice, "I think this [project] will be it." However, despite interest from major studios, a big-time Hollywood writer, an Oscar-nominated actor, and a popular book series, the Bosch movie struggled to get off the ground.

After years of developmental purgatory, Mace Neufeld Productions failed to bring The Black Ice to the big screen. In May 2004, The Tampa Bay Times reported that Mace Neufeld Productions was still shopping the film version of The Black Ice. At the time, Paul Verhoeven was the latest director attached to the project. Mace Neufeld Productions’ Head of Development, Kel Simon, thinks the reason for the film's floundering concerned the Bosch character's dark personality. Simon told The Tampa Bay Times, "Bosch has got a very dark personality that most Hollywood movies tend to shy away from. It's not the kind of movie they want to make these days."

'Bosch' Finally Gets Off the Ground at Amazon

Some years later, Harry Bosch is finally given his due in the form of a new TV pilot from Amazon Studios, first announced in October 2013. Simply titled Bosch, the pilot for the drama series stars Welliver as the eponymous detective, with author Connelly on board as an executive producer and co-writer for the pilot. It debuted in February 2014 and received enough fan support that Amazon picked up Bosch for a full series order, which later debuted in February 2015.

Together, Bosch and Bosch: Legacy have been on for a total of nine seasons and 88 episodes, with one more season on the way for Legacy. By adapting Bosch for the television format, Connelly took greater creative oversight of the project, and the series had more freedom to delve into the books' darker thematic material. It's not uncommon for Harry Bosch to deal with victims of sexual violence, child murder, and abuse; as a big-budget Hollywood adaptation, Bosch likely would have risked compromising the integrity of its material and getting released in a more sanitized, PG-13 format, much like the live-action theatrical Jack Reacher movies. It's probably for the best that Bosch was first adapted for television, with Welliver in the lead role over Travolta.