Paramount Enlisting Akiva Goldsman Expanding ‘Transformers’

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Paramount Pictures has announced that Akiva Goldsman will oversee the development and writing of forthcoming TRANSFORMERS movies, with input from Michael Bay, Steven Spielberg and producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura. The idea is essentially to staff a TV-style writer’s room that will cobble together screenplays for official TRANSFORMERS sequels and, you guessed it, spinoffs.

Though Goldsman is the Oscar-winning writer of A Beautiful Mind and many other big pics, I don’t get the impression the deal being negotiated calls for him to write one of these films. His will be an oversight role to secure writers and hatch the movies they’ll script. This is happening very quickly. Bay, who has directed all four Transformers films and most recently helmed Transformers: Age Of Extinction, is readying to next direct the Benghazi siege drama 13 Hours. He’d like to have something hammered out when he completes production so that the next Transformers pic can move forward quickly.

Disney has been ultra-aggressive since it bought Marvel, which has cranked out superhero films with regularity, and it has done the same since buying Lucasfilm. It created the infrastructure for three main Star Wars films — one with JJ Abrams directing and two with Looper helmer Rian Johnson. It also has spinoffs aplenty starting with Rogue One, the Gareth Edwards-directed film to star Felicity Jones and Ben Mendelsohn.

It’s not hard to see why Paramount covets more Transformers installments. The most recent, Transformers: Age Of Extinction, grossed nearly $1.1 billion, and became the top grossing release ever in China. And despite gross payouts that included Bay and the film’s star Mark Wahlberg, the film still generated $250 million in net profits to Paramount.

Goldsman, like Bay and Wahlberg, is repped by WME.

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Kristin

During my down time, I'm with my hubby and 2 boys. If I'm not with them, I'm reading or on Twitter finding out what's new. You can find me on Twitter (@Iam_Kristin_FN or @kdub_s), Instagram (Kdub_s) or Pinterest (Kristin Winker)