News: Fox Hires Staples to Adapt "Silk Road"

Screenwriter Will Staples has been hired by 20th Century Fox to write the script for Dark Web, based on Wired magazine’s article The Untold Story of Silk Road. 

The script will focus on the remarkable true story of 29-year-old Texan Ross Ulbricht, an aspiring entrepreneur who harbored a sinister secret identity: Ulbricht was allegedly the drug kingpin known as Dread Pirate Roberts, the owner and administrator of the notorious Silk Road, an online bazaar that became known worldwide as "the Amazon.com for illegal drugs." Ulbricht was arrested for suspicion of drug trafficking, soliciting murder, facilitating computer hacking, and money laundering. In May, he was sentenced to life in prison.

At its height, the Silk Road generated $1.3 billion in sales until Roberts put a hit out on his customer service representative, a 47 year-old Mormon from Utah. The hit, however, turned out to be part of an elaborate sting orchestrated by a DEA agent, and triggered to a race between the DEA and FBI to uncover Roberts’ true identity.

Ivana Lombardi will serve as the production executive, while Peter Chernin and Jenno Topping will produce through Chernin Entertainment. 

Staples got his start writing for video games, displaying a knack for testosterone-driven spectacle with credits that include blockbuster games Lair, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, and Need for Speed: Rivals. He has several projects in development, including King Tut at Di Bonaventura Pictures, Apaches with Jerry Bruckheimer Films, and an untitled project with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s Pearl Street Films about a team of mercenaries who set out to kill a brutal African warlord.

Do you have your own action script? Submit it to ScreenCraft's Action & Thriller Screenplay Contest!

Source: The Tracking Board