Game Change helmer Jay Roach is at it again with yet another politically charged project for HBO Films. Following a brief return to theatrical features via the Will Ferrell-lead comedy The Campaign (releasing next month,) Roach will now turn his attention to the far more serious Cold War-era project K Blows Top. Producing will be Tom Hank’s Playtone banner which is the group Roach worked for last time he visited the small screen.
According to THR, the story is about “Nikita Khrushchev’s 13-day American sojourn in September 1959, a time when Cold War tensions between the world superpowers were running high.” The trip saw the Soviet premier visiting several U.S. cities and even attempting to go to Disney Land although it was cancelled due to security reasons. The historical source material comes from a Peter Carlson’s book of the same name with Paul Bernbaum adapting.
Paul Giamatti will be set to return to the premium channel in the role of former Russian leader which makes this the actor’s second attachment to an HBO film in a short period of time. The Academy Award-nominee recently played Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke in the network’s award-winning movie Too Big To Fail which chronicled the fallout from the financial mayhem that took place in 2008.