Tony Scott dances to '80s tune

Film based on Chippendales creator Banerjee

By MICHAEL FLEMING

Chippendales

Scott

Tony Scott has become attached to direct a film about the rise and fall of Steve Banerjee, the man responsible for creating Chippendales, who was consumed by excess and competition when the male strip clubs became a phenomenon in the 1980s.

Scott and his Scott Free banner will produce with David Permut's Permut Presentations and Firoz Nadiadwala.

Script will be written by Lisa Schrager, who penned the Heidi Fleiss story "Pay the Girl" for Nicole Kidman at Paramount and "Gangsta Bitches" at Universal. She will adapt a manuscript written by Rodney Sheldon.

Pic is being financed from a private equity fund raised out of India by Permut.

With a tone similar to the Scott-directed "True Romance," pic will follow the improbable rise and fall of Banerjee, who went from pumping gas in Culver City to running a high-end nightclub that evolved into Chippendales. After hiring a New York choreographer to polish the all-male dance troupe, Banerjee became wildly rich, as well as unreasonably competitive and paranoid. Banerjee hired a hitman to murder the choreographer when negotiations went sour. After being arrested, Banerjee died in jail awaiting trial.

Scott is currently directing the Denzel Washington-Chris Pine starrer "Unstoppable" for 20th Century Fox.

Permut produced "Youth in Revolt," the Michael Cera-Zach Galifianakis comedy that Dimension opens early next year.

Peter Saphier will be executive producer and Steve Longi will be co-producer.