British director Tony Scott is set to shoot the turbulent life and times of Chippendales founder Somen "Steve" Banerjee, a millionaire entrepreneur who fell spectacularly from grace. Variety reports that the as-yet-untitled biopic is based on a script by Lisa Schrager and will be bankrolled by a private equity fund based in India.
Banerjee was the Bengali immigrant to the US who devised and managed the Chippendales, a troupe of muscular male strippers. His life took him from a job at a California petrol station to running a multimillion dollar business during the 1980s. But Banerjee's mounting paranoia and criminal tactics would eventually trip him up. He attempted to burn down two rival nightclubs and was later arrested for hiring a hit-man to assassinate his former business partner along with two onetime Chippendale dancers. Banerjee hanged himself in his prison cell in October 1994, just hours before he was due to be sentenced.
Scott's last film was the action blockbuster The Taking of Pelham 123. He is currently directing Denzel Washington in Unstoppable, a drama about a runaway freight train. A start date for the Banerjee biopic has yet to be announced.