Affleck To Star And Direct WWII Story
Ben Affleck will direct and star in an adaptation of Rick Beyer and Elizabeth Sayles’ 2015 book, The Ghost Army Of World War II, for Universal.
Ghost Army will tell the story follows the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops, a unique unit comprised of actors, artists, performers, and other creatives recruited out of ad agencies and art schools who were charged with deceiving Nazi forces across Europe.
The 23rd, which consisted of 1,100 personnel, created inflatable tanks, trucks, artillery, and rubber planes. They wired up loudspeakers to the back of military trucks and blasted pre-recorded audio of tanks rumbling by and men-at-work, cussing and swearing.
Faux radio messages were sent back and forth between the squads of the Ghost Army, discussing troop movements and units. This exercise of disinformation was all a ruse, with German code-crackers in mind.
Towards the end of the War in 1944-45, the Ghost Army had staged a number of these elaborate deceptions. They moved massive formations of fake tanks, and phony armor across Europe, with some real vehicles, added to the mix to create some authenticity.
Ghost Army will be directed off a script written by Nic Pizzolatto. HBO’s True Detective mastermind does have some film credits in his IMDB including The Magnificent Seven remake, and last year’s Galveston.
More on this as it develops.
