Is Aaron Sorkin Going to Write the Steve Jobs Biopic?

The world's greatest screenwriter may be taking on the toughest task of his career

  • Share
  • Read Later
Christian Alminana/WireImage

Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin attends the TIME Warner Seminar as part of the Cannes Lions 58th International Festival Of Creativity at Palais des Festivals on June 22, 2011 in Cannes, France

He’s already inhabited the life and times of Mark Zuckerberg, to Oscar-winning effect on The Social Network. Will Steve Jobs be next up for Aaron Sorkin?

The creator of The West Wing, who most recently contributed his wondrous words to the Brad Pitt vehicle Moneyball, was speaking at the PS Arts Express Yourself 2011 event in Santa Monica, Calif., on Wednesday and confirmed that he was reading former TIME managing editor Walter Isaacson’s biography of the late Apple founder.

(PHOTOS: The Long, Extraordinary Career of Steve Jobs)

And despite the book having been widely read, when someone of the stature of Sorkin says he’s reading it, people pay attention. “Sony has asked me to write the movie, and it’s something I’m strongly considering,” Sorkin told E! Online. “Right now I’m just in the thinking-about-it stages. It’s a really big movie, and it’s going to be a great movie no matter who writes it,” he went on to say. “He was a great entrepreneur, he was a great artist, a great thinker. He’s probably inspired [my 11-year-old daughter] Roxy more than he’s inspired me … she plays with all his toys,” Sorkin added.

Sony purchased the rights to the Isaacson book a few weeks before its publication in October, and it’s hardly surprising they’ve pinpointed Sorkin as their man. The Social Network was nominated for eight Oscars, winning three, including Best Screenplay for Sorkin. It was Sorkin’s script that was perceived to make the potentially dry subject matter more interesting than it might have turned out in someone else’s hands. If Sorkin does sign on, don’t be surprised if the studio then sets its sights on The Social Network‘s director, David Fincher, though he does have a rather full roster with the Millennium trilogy.

The “plot” seems like ripe Sorkin material: the long-standing rivalry between Jobs and Microsoft founder Bill Gates; a falling-out with Eric Schmidt, the Google chief executive; and the rumored verbal attacks on employees, stemming from a fierce temper.

And Sorkin has his own backstory with Jobs from which to draw: the pair spoke regularly on the phone and Sorkin was even asked to write a Pixar movie, which he turned down because he didn’t “know how to tell those stories.” But Sorkin might be swayed by the fact there’s hardly anything committed to screen on Jobs. His only real competition is 1999’s made-for-TV docudrama Pirates of Silicon Valley, which starred Noah Wyle as Jobs. But with Wyle’s former ER co-star George Clooney supposedly in the frame for the Sony movie, the buzz surrounding this project is only going to get bigger. (via The Daily Telegraph)

LIST: Top 10 Apple Moments