Cleopatra: A Life, the biography by Stacy Schiff, will be adapted into a 3D movie starring actress Angelina Jolie as the Queen of the Nile.
Rumors say that Jolie’s partner Brad Pitt is being considered to play Roman general Mark Anthony. The video embedded above features Schiff reading an excerpt from Cleopatra: A Life. According to The Telegraph, Schiff has endorsed both actors for these roles.
During an interview with MTV, Jolie favored The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo‘s director David Fincher as the best choice for the adaptation.
The Oscar winner also said she won’t play Cleopatra VII as a sexy vixen. Jolie told Stella magazine: “My performance will never be as lovely as Elizabeth [Taylor]’s. We are trying to get into a different truth about her as a pharaoh in history and not a sex symbol, because she really wasn’t … She is very interesting, but she wasn’t a great beauty.”
Schiff corroborates Jolie’s observations in her book. Last year, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer revealed in an interview with GalleyCat that the last pharaoh of ancient Egypt amassed an incredible fortune during her reign and that “goes a long way as well toward explaining her charms to a profligate Roman.” (via Digital Spy)