Wolper takes 'Hell of a Gamble'

By VARIETY STAFF

Producer David L. Wolper has acquired film rights to a nonfiction book that chronicles what really happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.

Wolper said he is looking to hire a screenwriter to shape the material, anticipating a mid-1998 shooting start.

Though the film might be nominally fictional, it would be based on new facts uncovered by Russian historian Aleksandr Fursenko and his Stateside counterpart Timothy Naftali in their 1997 book "One Hell of a Gamble," published by W.W. Norton & Co.

Among the most surprising aspects of the book is the proof Fursenko found buried in Kremlin archives that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev fully intended to use tactical nuclear weapons against any U.S. invasion force sent into Cuba after the failed Bay of Pigs invasion the year before.

Veteran documentary, telepic and feature producer Wolper most recently served as executive producer on Warner Bros.' "L.A. Confidential."