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Adam McKay & Ruben Fleischer Among Potential ‘Ant-Man’ Directors

By Jack Gattanella on Fri 30 May, 2014

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The Hollywood Reporter today got the scoop that three directors have been announced as in contention for the spot opened up for Marvel/Disney’s Ant-Man following the departure of director Edgar Wright.  They are Adam McKay, Ruben Fleisher, and Rawson Marshall Thurber.

They may not be house-hold-name types exactly (or even among the geek/cult aficionados like Wright was for his Cornetto trilogy), but they have some established credits, and it would appear that uber-producer Kevin Feige and Marvel are looking for a solidly comic tone for the movie, which is still set for a July 17th release next year.

What have these directors done?  Little things you may have heard of like the Anchorman series and Will Ferrell movies like Step Brothers (McKay); Dodgeball and the recent We’re the Millers (Thurber); and Zombieland (Fleischer). Even for Fleischer, whose last film Gangster Squad was not a critical success, has some cache due to the hit ‘zom-com’ and 30 Minutes of Less.

As far as scheduling goes it’s difficult to see who would be best available as McKay just finished a new Ferrell comedy Get Hard and is producing constantly for Ferrell’s company Gary Sanchez.  Thurber is attached to a sequel to ‘Millers‘, but aside from that according to his IMDb his schedule is free (though THR reports he is in talks for a Disney comedy called Overnight, which could make him a more choice pick given the Disney-Marvel connection).  And Fleischer has a number of projects in development, mostly in television, and produced a rom-com coming soon called Two Night Stand.

Decision on the director will be coming likely in the next week, as shooting has to begin soon in order to meet the July 2015 release deadline.  It’s also unclear from the THR article whether the script that was written for Ant-Man by Wright and Joe Cornish would be used for production (Cornish’s name was not listed in contention either, this despite his cult success with Attack the Block, though there’s likely solidarity there with his collaborator).

Any of these names strike your fancy?  Let us know in the comments or on Twitter @

Jack is a graduate of film studies from William Paterson University in Wayne, NJ, and is currently seeking his MFA in Screenwriting at the Academy of Art. He is a screen-writer, film critic, director, and editor, and has also done camera-work for web-series, doccumentaries and shorts. Currently Jack is seeking distribution for his feature film drama, “Green Eyes“, co-produced a sci-fi feature, Audrey Lorea‘s ‘Heaven is Now.‘, as well as a comedy pilot called ‘Losers’ which is being shopped around to networks. He is also a contributing writer for the sites FocusFilm.co.uk, Film Forward, and some of his other reviews can be found on his blogcinetarium.blogspot.com. Jack is a vociferous fan of films and will watch anything interesting, foreign and domestic. He survives by his wife, a political science professor, and currently resides in Little Ferry, New Jersey, USA.
Related ItemsAdam McKayAnt-ManCornettoEdgar WrightJoe CornishMarvelRawson Marshall ThurberRuben Fleischer