It’s a bit crazy to me that Zac Efron, he who got his start in High School Musical, is now older enough (33) to be a father but, hey, time stops for no man.
That’s exactly what Efron will play for Blumhouse’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Firestarter. Collider reports that Efron just signed onto star in the film as the titular firestarter’s father, Andy. For those who don’t know, the 1980 novel was about a father and daughter, both cursed with government-injected superpowers, who are now on the run from the agency that altered them. Efron’s character has the ability to “push” people telepathically while his daughter Charlie has a much scarier skill: she can set things on fire with her mind.
The books has been adapted before, of course, starring a very young Drew Barrymore as the young girl. No one else is cast in this adaptation. All it’s got is some producers, a director (Keith Thomas), a writer (Scott Teems) and now a star in Efron.
Efron is definitely not the first person I had in mind to lead this picture but his casting makes a lot of sense. After getting his start in teen-aimed fare, you can tell that Efron has been itching to break out of the hunky mold in which he’s been cast. He seems to be this close to breaking out of that type of career and becoming more like a Ryan Gosling or Robert Pattinson: handsome but also talented. Perhaps Firestarter will be the sort of project that sets his career on the path he’s been waiting for.