Brenda Joyce with Johnny Weissmuller in 'Tarzan and the Leopard Woman' (1946)

Whilst promoting his latest screenplay, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, writer Stuart Beattie (Pirates of the Caribbean / 30 Days of Night) has talked up a couple of other projects on his list.  One such project that you may find interesting is his vision to reboot Tarzan, the Lord of the Apes.

“It’s not your traditional Tarzan,” Beattie told SCI FI Wire.  “It’s your Pirates of the Caribbean kind of Tarzan. It’s fun. It’s how a Tarzan movie should be. It’s just, because Tarzan’s been done so many times, you can’t just do the standard retelling of Tarzan again, because everyone knows that story. If you’re going to do Tarzan, you’ve got to do it different than it’s ever been done.”

“[It's going to be a] more mythological and supernatural, mythic Africa, where the trees are two or three times the size of trees,” Beattie said. “It’s that deep, deep, deep, dark, heart-of-Africa jungle that no one’s ever been [to], 1930s, period, all that kind of stuff, and really bring that world up into that kind of mythic status, where Tarzan can fly around on all these trees and do amazing acrobatics. I just had a lot of fun with it.”

Tarzan was originally authored by famous eauthor Edgar Rice Burroughs and although some adaptations of Burroughs’ source material have deviated from it none have taken Tarzan into the realms of complete super-hero style fantasy.

“It’s mainly new stuff, because it’s the kind of stuff that Edgar Rice Burroughs, I don’t think, could have possibly imagined,” Beattie said, referring to the capabilities of modern special effects. “There’s certainly nothing like it in the books, so I guess I can’t really speak to what he was thinking when he wrote them, but it certainly raises it all up a notch to be like a big, fun summer movie.”

Although Tarzan hasn’t yet been given the official nod, Warner Bros. are apparently looking for Stephen Sommers (G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra / The Jungle Book / The Mummy) to direct.

In other Tarzan news, Brenda Joyce, the only actress to play Jane opposite two different Tarzans, died at a nursing home on July 4 at age 97 (she was born 25 February 1912).

In 1945 Joyce appeared as Jane opposite Johnny Weissmuller in Tarzan and the Amazons and played the role in four more Tarzan movies through until 1949 after which she never made a movie again.  Best wishes to her surviving family and friends.

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