Zac Efron is to star in ‘King of the Jungle’, a forthcoming comedy film about cybersecurity magnate John McAfee, according to Hollywood news site Deadline.
Based on a series of Wired articles by Joshua Davis, the film casts Efron as journalist Ari Furman, who travels to Belize to document McAfee in a seemingly routine assignment. Upon his arrival, Furman discovers that McAfee has quit society and “set up a Colonel Kurtz-like compound of guns, sex and madness.” Efron, as Furman, then covers “McAfee’s escalating paranoia, slippery reality and murder.”
The project has been in development for some time, with Seth Rogen previously attached to play Furman and Michael Keaton in the role of McAfee; both have since dropped out, with the role of McAffee currently being recast.
Efron is best known for playing Troy Bolton in the ‘High School Musical’ series, and serial killer Ted Bundy in ‘Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile’.
There is no word yet on whether the film will also cover McAfee’s foray into crypto. McAfee thinks that Bitcoin will hit $1 million; offered to build a cryptocurrency for the Cuban government; and last month launched an Ethereum-based decentralised exchange, McAfeeDEX. McAfeeDEX is still in beta, but should be operational in around six months.
Last week, McAfee gave a talk at Barcelona Blockchain Week, where he compared government legislation against cryptocurrency to prohibition in the US, where the sale of alcohol was illegal, yet alcohol consumption widespread.
“No word yet if Efron fans can expect a topless moment in the pic à la that Ryan Gosling scene in 'Crazy, Stupid, Love',” wrote Deadline.com. A crypto journalist can only dream.