Which of the following names doesn’t belong: Tom Cruise, Denzel Washington, Tommy Lee Jones, Matthew McConaughey, Matt Damon, and Zac Efron. That’s a trick question.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Zac Efron will star in and produce a film adaptation of The Associate, one of the many novels written by John Grisham. Efron will join the actors listed above as actors to star in a Grisham adaptation.
Originally published in 2009, The Associate follows a Yale Law School graduate who gets blackmailed by criminals who force him to spy for them at one of the world’s biggest law firms.
Here’s how Amazon describes the novel:
Kyle McAvoy possesses an outstanding legal mind. Good-looking and affable, he has a glittering future. He also has a dark secret that could destroy his dreams, his career, even his life. One night that secret catches up with him. The men who accost Kyle have a compromising video they’ll use to ruin him–unless he does exactly what they say. What they offer Kyle is something any ambitious young lawyer would kill for: a job in Manhattan as an associate at the world’s largest law firm. If Kyle accepts, he’ll be on the fast track to partnership and a fortune. But there’s a catch. Kyle won’t be working for the firm but against it in a dispute between two powerful defense contractors worth billions. Now Kyle is caught between the criminal forces manipulating him, the FBI, and his own law firm–in a malignant conspiracy not even Kyle with all his intellect, cunning, and bravery may be able to escape alive.
The Associate will be Efron’s second production under his Ninja’s Runnin banner. Earlier this year he produced That Awkward Moment.
Efron has the comedy film Neighbors on the horizon. He’ll star alongside Seth Rogen. The film is scheduled to be released on May 9.