Wikipedia tells me “Jonny Quest” is a 1964 science fiction/adventure animated television series produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions, and created and designed by comic book artist Doug Wildey, about Jonny Quest, a boy who accompanies his father on extraordinary adventures. Hero Complex tells me Zac Efron (High School Musical) will play Jonny Quest in a feature film adaptation for Warner Bros. with Dwayne Johnson circling the project and may possibly play the brawny version of pilot and man-of-action Race Bannon.
Geoff Boucher at “Hero Complex” points out the casting may not sit well with fans since Quest was only 11-years-old in the cartoon and Efron is the ripe young age of 21. However, Boucher, a confessed fan of Quest, seems optimistic saying, “I myself think it’s a surprising but interesting choice, and I’m one of the people in town who think Efron (like Justin Timberlake) has a big future ahead of him and that people will look back on his frothy Disney duty as just the early steps in the choreography of his career.”
The script by Dan Mazeau was featured on the 2008 Black List (a list of what is considered to be the best, unproduced scripts in Hollywood), but word is the failure of Speed Racer to gain traction with audiences has held up the project. Boucher even says Warner Bros. has plans of ditching the title “Jonny Quest” as to attempt to completely separate itself from any comparison to Speed Racer.
Obviously I have no idea what “Jonny Quest” actually entails outside of the little video I included in this post for those that may be just as curious as me, but I am all up for another adventure series of films, especially with Boucher’s comparisons of “Quest” to Milton Canniff, Ian Fleming and Rudyard Kipling.
Anyone out there familiar with the cartoon care to talk about their thoughts of a live-action adaptation and the casting of Efron?
