Universal Loses Rights to Jason Bourne and the Rest of the Robert Ludlum Library

Movies

Jason Bourne is about to lose his memory again. An exclusive from The Hollywood Reporter reveals that Universal has lost its rights to the Bourne franchise, which is being shopped around to other studios, along with the rest of author Robert Ludlum’s books, by Ludlum’s estate. Potential buyers specifically mentioned are Netflix, Apple, and Skydance, although Universal could potentially get the rights back depending on what they offer the Ludlum estate, who apparently want Jason Bourne to be “a more regular presence onscreen.” Ludlum’s Bourne trilogy – The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, and The Bourne Ultimatum – were extremely loosely adapted into a successful series of movies starring Matt Damon as Jason Bourne; when the source novels – or, at least, their titles – were used up, Universal made a sort of side-quel called The Bourne Legacy with Jeremy Renner as a new character, then brought Bourne back in Jason Bourne, once again starring Damon. The Bourne Legacy is the name of the first continuation novel written by Eric Van Lustbader after Ludlum’s death; once again, the movie had nothing to do with the book outside of the title. A fifth (or sixth, if you count Legacy) Bourne movie had been in development for a while, but it must not have materialized before the customary deadline to maintain the rights to the franchise.

I’m both excited and worried about what will come of this move. I’m a huge Robert Ludlum fan, and I adore many of his books; in fact, it took me a while to warm to the Bourne movies because they were so different from Ludlum’s novels. The Bourne Identity director Doug Liman tailored the movie to fit his political opinions, which he admitted on the commentary track to The Bourne Identity (which is a good listen; I was surprised to learn that Liman knew the book very well), and then his successor, Paul Greengrass, ramped that into overdrive. But once I got over the differences, I enjoyed the movies as a sort of alternate universe version of the character and his world. Now that it’s being shopped around, I imagine everyone is thinking about a reboot. Obviously, a version that hews closer to the books would be a neat idea, but I don’t think it’ll happen; the movie version, for better or worse, is what people think of when they hear “Jason Bourne” now, and I doubt anyone will want to stray too far from that. (There was a miniseries based on The Bourne Identity in the 80s with Richard Chamberlain that’s much more faithful to the book, although it still takes some liberties.) Another possibility would be to finally make another sequel with Matt Damon, but unless Universal gets the rights back, I don’t see that happening either; Damon is 54, and they want to keep the franchise going for a while. So, I think we’re in reboot territory, but it’ll be a reboot using the movies as the source material rather than the books, which is a shame.

What interests me more than new Jason Bourne movies is the idea of adapting some of Ludlum’s other books. A few have been made over the years, but the films are mostly forgotten now, and many of the big ones have never been adapted. After the success of the Bourne movies, Universal was talking about making some of the others, but they never happened. I’d love to see some more of his books turned into movies, but I don’t know how well they’ll work unless they’re set during the Cold War, something I don’t see Hollywood doing. (I also don’t want them tailored for the imaginary “modern audience.”) However, the fact that Netflix is looking at them makes me think they could become miniseries, which would maybe suit them better than movies; Ludlum’s books usually fall in the 500-700-page range. They could even make it an anthology series – call it Robert Ludlum Presents, and each season is a different book. I think they could be very popular, too; Ludlum’s books are full of action, suspense, and political skullduggery (more government being crooked than anything partisan, though), with evil organizations, vast conspiracies, and plenty of paranoia, chases, and near-death encounters. If you want an idea of what they’re like, Captain America: The Winter Soldier is basically a Robert Ludlum novel brought to the screen, only with superheroes; the structure of the film almost perfectly replicates the structure of his books (and pretty much everybody considers that one of the best Marvel movies ever). If you’ve never read them, I highly recommend giving them a try. And, since I like to give myself a treat every now and then, here are some of the Ludlum books I think they should adapt (you can also take this as a recommended reading list if you like):

The Matarese Circle

This is the quintessential Robert Ludlum book. A secret society called the Matarese, made up of important figures in the US and Russian governments, is planning to take control of the two nations, and the only men who can stop them are American spy Brandon Scofield and KGB agent Vasili Taleniekov. The rub is that the two are arch-enemies; Teleniekov killed Scofield’s wife, and Scofield killed Taleniekov’s brother. This is one of the novels Universal was going to adapt, and they had Denzel Washington and Tom Cruise in mind for the leads, which is not particularly good casting. I love Denzel, but how would a black man be able to function as a spy in Russia, especially during the Cold War? And Tom Cruise would actually have been a much better choice for a different role, although it’s a minor part that he probably wouldn’t take. Scofield and Taleniekov are supposed to be in their 50s and jaded after decades as ruthless spies, so hopefully, they would resist the urge to go too young with these roles. I imagine they would leave out the part where Scofield makes his love interest realize the folly and evils of communism, which is a shame. The Matarese Circle is the perfect example of a Ludlum book that only really makes sense if it’s set during the Cold War, so hopefully, the rights go to a studio willing to leave the modern era.

The Holcroft Covenant

Noel Holcroft is contacted about his late father’s estate, and he becomes involved in a war with the Sonnenkinder, a group of children smuggled out of Germany after World War II and raised to be Nazi sleeper agents who will attain power in the West and bring about the Fourth Reich. Ludlum wrote about the Sonnenkinder (a real conspiracy theory for some time) in a couple of his books, most notably this and The Apocalypse Watch. The Holcroft Covenant is full of action, mysteries, assassinations, and secret societies as the hero tries to stop the Nazi regime from rising again thirty years later. This was already made into a movie with the great Michael Caine in the lead role, but it wasn’t very good; it had almost no action or suspense, never capturing the desperation of the book. I’d love to see it done right, especially the terrific ending.

The Chancellor Manuscript

Bestselling novelist Peter Chancellor writes fiction based on his penchant for seeing conspiracies, but when he pitches his publisher a new book about J. Edgar Hoover’s seemingly naturalistic death being a covert assassination, he uncovers a real one. This puts him in the crosshairs of Inver Brass, a group of America’s intellectual elite – a college professor, a Supreme Court justice, and so on – who plot in the shadows and steer the country in the direction they want it to go. The Chancellor Manuscript was another one Universal was planning to make; they wanted Leonardo DiCaprio to play Chancellor, and he would’ve been great, although he’s aged out of the role now. It would be fun to watch Hollywood spin a story about a bunch of left-wing snobs who overrule the American public because they’re convinced they know better without somehow making them the good guys.

The Aquitaine Progression

Former soldier and current lawyer Joel Converse meets an old acquaintance from his service days in Switzerland, and just before the man dies, he warns Converse about a coming danger that will sweep the world. Suddenly, Converse is running from assassins and trying to expose a group of generals from various countries planning a worldwide military coup d’état. The premise alone is enough for me to want to see this adapted, and it seems like the one Hollywood would be most interested in, especially since it’s one of the few that doesn’t rely on the Cold War, at least as far as I recollect. You can see the trailers already, full of troop deployments and veteran actors full of gravitas as the Aquitaine generals. (I remember the American general being described as sounding like a meowing cat when he yelled; it would be cool if they kept that detail.)

The Parsifal Mosaic

American spy Michael Havelock loses the woman he loves, Jenna Karas, when she’s revealed to be a traitor and killed on the beach in front of him. Years later, after leaving the service, he sees Jenna at a train station in Rome, very much alive. Havelock re-enters the spy game as a rogue agent, searching for Jenna as both sides of the Cold War divide hunt him down and uncovering a group of Soviet spies who have infiltrated the American government and are plotting a doomsday scenario that will cripple Russia’s capitalist enemy. This one was also on Universal’s to-do list, only they were planning to turn it into a Bourne sequel. I have no idea how they would have managed that since Michael Havelock and Jason Bourne are very different characters, but they didn’t much care about the plots of the Bourne books, so I guess it wouldn’t have mattered. This is also a story that is dependent on the Cold War, so it won’t work in a modern setting. But it’s a great book, and I’d love to see a big, romantic, action-packed adaptation. One excellent chapter in the book details how an interrogation using sodium pentothal (or something akin to it) works; that would make for a nail-biter of a scene.

This is just a smattering of the Robert Ludlum works I’d like to see adapted, though. I truly hope something great comes of this deal, but the realist in me knows to remember it’s the current year, and good things don’t often happen in Hollywood anymore.

Let us know what you think of the Jason Bourne franchise and Robert Ludlum’s other books being shopped around Hollywood in the comments!

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