Quasimodo: Hunchback of Notre Dame, Action Hero and Funny Guy?

Once upon a time, Terry Gilliam was planning a live-action, biggish budget version of Victor Hugo’s Notre Dame de Paris, popularly known outside of France as The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He abandoned the plan after seeing the Disney animation – not because it was perfect, because it wasn’t, but because it was too close, just here and there, to what he had in mind.

The latest version to get into development sounds like it couldn’t be more different from anything Gilliam would ever dream of doing. In fact, so far it sounds like the sort of thing he uses in place of firewood.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the pitch for the new version was that it would be an action/comedy and would borrow its “framework” from Hugo’s tale, but also have some “original ideas”. Screenwriters Willie Block (no he won’t) and Jake Emanuel cooked the idea up at Lorenzo’s Di Bonaventura pictures and have now secured the support (read: money) of Paramount. All parties seem to be trying (again) to emulate the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

Let’s start the online campaign now, anyway: Jason Statham for Quasimodo.