Disney’s adaptation of The Lone Ranger was coming together nicely. Gore Verbinski was set to direct, Johnny Depp was attached to play Tonto, and Armie Hammer was cast as the titular hero. The project fell apart last month, but a new day has come for The Lone Ranger.
Deadline Hollywood relays that the film will in fact be made and that Disney should officially announce it in the next few days.
For the project to come back together, the deals made for Depp, Verbinski, and Jerry Bruckheimer were reworked. Additionally, cuts were made to the extensive time proposed for filming and the production budget, which was somewhere in the ballpark of $200 million.
Production looks to begin early next year in January or February. Considering that The Lone Ranger is scheduled for release on December 12, 2012, it looks like it’ll be a quite hurried rush through the filming phase.