Ray Stevenson says Rome movie is on

Ray Stevenson is going on the record as saying that a film version of the BBC/HBO series Rome is now out of rumour status and crawling through development.

“It is no longer a smoke and mirrors rumour. The script is in full development,” he told Movieweb. “As you are probably aware, this is a pretty strange process. We could go into production in a year, or it could be as quick as six months. Who knows?”

Of course, this is just one of the stars of the show reporting what he’s heard, but it certainly sounds like Stevenson has some knowledge of what’s going on.

But the real news, we’d guess, will come from series co-creator Brunp Heller, which Stevenson admits. “Bruno is the one writing the movie, thankfully. I don't think anybody else could write the movie. It will be Bruno at the helm. That guy has a soft spot for Pullo and Vorenus. I don't think he will let the ball drop. I don't think he will disappoint.”

Given that Rome was somewhat abruptly cancelled (mostly due to the high cost of shooting in those huge Italian sets), we’d be excited to see more from Stevenson and Kevin McKidd’s Vorenus (above).

But will the final film be able to keep up with the series’ boundary-pushing material and still be a marketable release? Only time will tell…