If you saw the Oscar-nominated documentary Citizenfour last year, chances are the names Laura Poitras, Glenn Greenwald and Ewen MacAskill sound pretty familiar. The former is the director of the documentary, while the latter two were journalists who were in conservations with Edward Snowden before and during his controversial leak.
While all three were on the big screen already, they're set to return in due time — but this time, they'll not be seen as themselves. For Oliver Stone's upcoming, untitled Edward Snowden biopic, the Platoon director cast Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto and Tom Wilkinson to play Poitras, Greenwald and MacAskill, respectively.
The Wrap got first word on the casting deals. They join Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who leads the upcoming film as Snowden, as well as Shailene Woodley, who plays Snowden's longtime girlfriend Lindsay Malls. Also cast in the film already is Scott Eastwood, son of Clint Eastwood.
As seen in Citizenfour, all three journalists played a key role in Snowden's story. They were in Hong Kong next to Snowden, and were all brought in by the man himself to release the information he sat on from his NSA position.
Open Road Films and Endgame Entertainment partnered up to make this movie. The upcoming film is based on the books Time of the Octopus, written by Anatoly Kucherena, Snowden's Russian lawyer — whose also seen in Citizenfour — and The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World’s Most Wanted Man, written by journalist Luke Harding. The film gears to start production soon, with Moritz Borman and Eric Kopeloff producing.
Wilkinson can be seen now in Best Picture nominees Selma and The Grand Budapest Hotel, and is soon set to be seen in Unfinished Business. Leo, meanwhile, soon will be seen in London Has Fallen and the TV series Wayward Pines later this year. Quinto stars in the Sundance-premiered I Am Michael, and also has Hitman: Agent 47 and the NBC event series The Slap coming out in 2015.
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