American comedian Walker Scobell has been hired by Disney to star in a new adaptation of Percy Jackson & the Olympians.
Walker Scobell (actor of Secret Headquarters, Entertainment Tonight, The Adam Project) will play Percy Jackson in the television series Percy Jackson & the Olympians for the Disney+ streaming platform. Like Rick Riordan’s famous novels, this one follows the adventures of a 12-year-old modern-day demigod who is just beginning to come to terms with his newfound supernatural powers when the sky god Zeus accuses him of stealing his lightning. Young Percy then crosses America to find him and restore order to Olympus.
Rick Riordan and John Steinberg are writing the pilot episode, and James Bobin will direct. John Steinberg is overseeing the reboot of the series with his producing partner Dan Shotz. The two also serve as executive producers along with James Bobin, Rick Riordan, Rebecca Riordan, Bert Salke, Monica Owusu-Bryn, Jim Rowe and Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, Jeremy Bell, and Gotham Group DJ Goldberg. Percy Jackson & the Olympians will begin production this summer.
Walker Scobell confirmed by Rick Riordan
“Walker Scobell is an incredibly talented young man who blew us away with his audition tapes for the role of Percy,” wrote Rick Riordan on his blog. Many of you recently learned just how great he is by watching him play in Project Adam, in which Walker appeared onscreen as the younger version of Ryan Reynolds’ character. We had the opportunity to audition Walker a few months before the release of this film, but the film only confirmed what we already knew about his talent. It was obvious to me and the rest of the team that Walker had the perfect combination of comedic tone, softness, rebelliousness, cunning and heroism to play our hero Percy Jackson.“