Rupert Friend to Star and Direct BARTON & CHARLIE & CHECCO & BILL, Emily Blunt to Co-Star?

Rupert Friend will make his feature directorial debut and star in BARTON & CHARLIE & CHECCO & BILL, which will be co-financed by Bron Studios and Fortitude International in association with Creative Wealth Media Finance, it was announced today.

Emily Blunt is in negotiations to co-star. Friend wrote the script and will produce alongside Aaron L. Gilbert of Bron Studios and Margot Hand. Fortitude's Nadine de Barros and Robert Ogden Barnum and Creative Wealth's Jason Cloth are executive producers. The film is scheduled to commence principal photography in Spring of 2015.

Fortitude's co-principal Nadine de Barros and Vice President of International Katie Irwin will kick-off sales at the American Film Market. CAA packaged and is handling domestic rights.

Stuck in a rut, a grifter meets a woman who just might change everything, and offers to teach her the tricks of his trade. She turns the tables on him and they embark on a road trip adventure of con-artistry, disguise, lies and love. They are pursued by the shadowy Bill, a Confederate newspaper mogul with handmade suits and a secret in his heart. Along for the ride is Checco, a 10-year old Mexican boy with an old soul, who, more than any of them, seems to know what really matters...

Friend is well known to television viewers from his Emmy-nominated role in HOMELAND. He and Blunt appeared together as Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in THE YOUNG VICTORIA, and he will play the title role in Fox's 2015 summer franchise HITMAN:AGENT 47.

Golden Globe winner Emily Blunt will be seen this Christmas in Disney's film adaptation of INTO THE WOODS and next year alongside Benicio del Toro and Josh Brolin in Lionsgate's SICARIO. She recently appeared opposite Tom Cruise in EDGE OF TOMORROW.

Fortitude International, the sales and financing venture launched earlier this year by de Barros, Robert Ogden Barnum, and Daniel Wagner, is currently handling sales on URGE, starring Pierce Brosnan, THE END OF THE TOUR starring Jesse Eisenberg and Jason Segal and directed by James Ponsoldt, DAUGHTER OF GOD with Keanu Reeves, and VINCENT-N-ROXXY starring Emile Hirsch and Zoë Kravitz.

Bron Studios, co-founded by Aaron L. Gilbert and Brenda Gilbert in 2010, is a British Columbia-based producer of original live-action and animated motion pictures and series television. The company has produced over a dozen films since its founding; working with new voices and established talents both in front of and behind the camera including; Will Ferrell, Kristen Wiig, William H. Macy, Ellen Page, Tim Robbins, Olivia Wilde, Billy Crudup, Zooey Deschanel, Anton Yelchin, Helen Hunt, Johnny Galecki, Anjelica Huston, Luke Wilson, Rebecca Hall, Jason Sudeikis, Elizabeth Olsen, James Marsden, Linda Cardellini, Tom Hiddleston, and many others.

Photo credit: RD / Orchon / Retna Digital

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