Aaron Sorkin Confirms: Christian Bale Is Playing Steve Jobs

Aaron Sorkin today confirmed what has long been rumored, that Christian Bale will go neck deep in turtlenecks to play Apple Co-Founder Steve Jobs in Sorkin’s Jobs biopic, directed by Danny Boyle and based on the book by Walter Isaacson. Bale, that son of a bitch, it’s like he’s knocking the Oscars right out of Ashton Kutcher’s mouth. They took yer jOBS!

Aaron Sorkin confirmed [Bale’s casting] in a Bloomberg Television interview with Emily Chang.

“We needed the best actor on the board in a certain age range and that’s Chris Bale,” Sorkin said. “He didn’t have to audition. Well, there was a meeting.”

“It was between Chris Bale, Joaq Phoenix, and Dirty-D Day-Lewis. Yeah, I got pet names for all the A-listers, NBD. I’m really quite something.”

Bale was originally eyed to play Jobs when David Fincher was in talks to direct, THR previously reported. Leonardo DiCaprio had also been in talks to star as Jobs before he bowed out and Bale emerged as a front-runner, along with Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Bradley Cooper.

The film, an adaptation of Walter Isaacson’s 2011 biography titled Steve Jobs, is set to begin shooting in the next couple of months, Bloomberg reported, with Danny Boyle set to direct after Fincher left the project. Sony optioned the best-selling book in 2011 around the time of Jobs’ death.

I hope they get Jonah Hill to play the Steve Wozniak/Josh Gad part, just to ladle on the “f*ck you” to jOBS.

 “He has more words to say in this movie than most people have in three movies combined,” Sorkin said. “There isn’t a scene or a frame that he’s not in. And there’s a tremendous amount of language. So it’s an extremely difficult part and he is gonna crush it.” [HollywoodReporter]

Oh good, for a minute there I was worried this was going to be a movie about Steve Jobs and not about Aaron Sorkin’s ego. I’m hoping Ya Think?! Different™ will have the kind of technology-related high drama we’ve come to expect from The Newsroom and Mr. Sorkin. I like to imagine Christian Bale hurling an iPhone against the wall of his mansion and slowly crumpling to the floor muttering, “It’s gone viral… it’s gone viral…”

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