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Big Screen Version of ‘Perry Mason’ Gathers Steam. Robert Downey Jr. Could Star. Co-Creator of a TV Lawyer Series Negotiating to Write the Screenplay

Feb 17, 2012  •  Post A Comment

A big screen version of one of the most famous series in the history of TV, "Perry Mason," is gathering momentum.

Robert Downey Jr. "is producing with his wife and partner Susan Downey and their banner Team Downey, along with Robert Cort," according to a story in The Hollywood Reporter, and Downey may star in the film for Warner Bros.

The latest news is that Marc Guggenheim, who "co-created the [TV] legal dramedy ‘Eli Stone,’ " is negotiating to write the screenplay, the story says. Guggenheim also "co-wrote the ‘Green Lantern’ movie and is exec producing and co-writing ‘Arrow,’ CW’s take on DC’s Green Arrow hero," the article says.

Mason, a stunningly successful defense attorney, was first the subject of a series of novels by Erle Stanley Gardner, then a radio series and then, in 1957, a TV series starring Raymond Burr as Mason.

The TV version was a hit in syndication as well, and when TBS got national distribution as a satellite "superstation" and picked up "Perry Mason" reruns, a new generation of viewers became enamored of the show.

Here at TVWeek we only have one question: "How successful can the movie be if everyone already knows the ending — that Perry Mason will win the case?"

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                                          The late Raymond Burr as Perry Mason

One Comment

  1. Not only is Robert Downey Jr the only American Actor in the world, he not even that good — he is the most overrated actor on Earth. And yet, even with the worst British accent on record, having done jail time and heavy drugs, his luck doesn’t seem to run out. Could he possibly be a Scientologist? His success has to be one great mysteries of Hollywood and he’s done it without botox — amazing.

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