Revisiting PoP

I think it's time we revisit that Prince of Persia script, in light of today's article in the Lowestoft Journal.

02 May 2008

FROM premieres in Berlin and Los Angeles to filming in New Zealand, Morocco and Alicante the jet-setting acting career of a rising star from Lowestoft is literally taking off.

Fresh from treading the red carpet at the premiere of 10,000 BC in March, it is continuing to be a busy schedule for Reece Ritchie as this week he received a double boost. For the Oulton Broad 21-year-old was flying to Alicante this week after he was picked to star with Colin Farrell for the film Triage.

The trip followed hard on the heels of being chosen for his latest assignment starring alongside Jake Gyllenhaal for the first-part of an expected trilogy in the film based on the video game Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.

The Disney film, which is being directed by Mike Newell (Harry Potter and Donnie Brasco) and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, is due for release in August 2009.

It follows the Playstation computer game classic about a prince who teams up with a rival princess to stop an angry ruler from unleashing a sandstorm that could destroy the world.

After attending auditions in London in January, Reece received the call that he'd got the part at the weekend and this means that he will be off to Morocco for filming of the video game adaptation in June.

With the project also set to be filmed at the UK Pinewood Shepperton studios, Gyllenhaal, who has appeared in The Day After Tomorrow and Brokeback Mountain, plays the prince with Ritchie being his accomplice and best friend. The part of Princess Farah has yet to be announced.

But before this the former Benjamin Britten High School pupil, who was back in the town this week with parents Jayne and Russell, brother Ross and sister Ria, is due to fly out to New Zealand again in the next couple of weeks to finish off post-production of the Alice Sebold novel The Lovely Bones.

After playing Moha - a bloodthirsty mammoth hunter - in 10,000 BC, Ritchie is cast as the romantic Ray Singh for The Lovely Bones, which has been directed by Peter Jackson (of Lord of the Rings fame) and this is due out in March next year.