Before McMillion$ became one of the most captivating, must-watch docuseries on HBO, the insane Monopoly game heist started out as a The Daily Beast article by Jeff Maysh that instantly went viral in the summer of 2018 and launched an intense bidding war for the films. Less than a week after the article was published, Ben Affleck walked away with to the film, which he planned to direct with Matt Damon to star. But it was no easy task. Hollywood wanted this story, and it wanted it bad. Deadline reports:
Sources said that bidding was ferocious for Maysh’s How An Ex-Cop Rigged McDonald’s Monopoly Game And Stole Millions. Lining up to bid were Universal for Kevin Hart, Warner Bros for John Requa & Glenn Ficarra and Steve Carell and producer Andrew Lazar, and Netflix, which bid for producing partners Eric Newman & Bryan Unkeless, Robert Downey Jr & Susan Downey, and Todd Phillips. The auction was handled by IPG’s Joel Gotler, who repped Maysh.
However, Affleck was set to direct the tentatively titled McScam for 20th Century Fox, which has gone through some changes since being acquired by Disney and talk of the movie fell to the wayside. But with McMillion$ pushing the unbelievable story back into the headlines, Collider checked in with Affleck for an update on his adaptation, which he says is still in the works.
“We’ve gotten a new draft. That’s really good. Hollywood’s a weird place, because the person who was running the studio when they bought that script, just left that job. And the studio that was going to make it got bought by another studio. So there’s these moments where things sort themselves out, and you sort of see ‘Is this still a priority, or are they really interested in different kinds of movies?’ And I’m not sure whether or not, McScam, what kind of priority it is. We really like it. We’re still developing the script.”
Of course, the big question is whether a movie version of Agent Doug can compete with the real thing. Will audiences settle for a fictionalized version of the gung-ho maniac when there are six hours of pure Agent Doug waiting for them on HBO? We’ll find out if McScam can Hamburglar its way out of development.
