Monopoly is one of the most famous board games in the world, so popular that concepts like the “get out of jail free card” and the mascot character, Mr. Monopoly, have become part of the pop culture lexicon. However, unlike fellow board games Clue or Battleship, Monopoly has never received a feature film adaptation. That certainly is not for lack of trying. Now, after languishing in development hell for nearly two decades, a Monopoly movie might finally pass go and enter production.
Deadline reports that Lionsgate has hired two groups of writers to develop separate Monopoly movies. The first is from Neil Widener and Gavin James, two of the credited screenwriters on the $950 million hit film, A Minecraft Movie. The second pitch comes from Rebecca Angelo and Lauren Schuker Blum, who previously wrote the 2023 dark satire Dumb Money. These pitches are in the early stages of development, and Lionsgate, LuckyChap Entertainment, and Hasbro Films will only move forward with one of them.
Monopoly was first published by Parker Brothers in 1935. The game itself is derived from Lizzie Magie’s 1903 game titled The Landlord’s Game. While the objective of Monopoly is to have the most money and property, the game was designed to teach about the dangers of monopolies. Hasbro became the distributor of Monopoly in 1993 following their purchase of Parker Brothers.
Development on a Monopoly movie dates back to 2008, when Ridley Scott was set to direct a feature film adaptation of the board game for Universal Pictures. Universal Pictures halted development on Monopoly in 2012, and Lionsgate picked up the distribution rights in 2015. Yet by this point, Scott was out. In 2019, Kevin Hart was set to star and produce a Monopoly film with Fantastic Four director Tim Story set to helm the project. In 2024, Hart was out, and Margot Robbie and Tom Ackerley’s production company, LuckyChap Entertainment, signed on to produce.
Before approaching Widener and James and Angelo and Blum, Lionsgate and Hasbro had previously set another writing duo to adapt Monopoly. In 2025, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein were set to pen the script for Monopoly. No reason for the duo’s departure has been mentioned, but they have since found themselves busy as the directors of the upcoming Star Trek reboot for Paramount Pictures. Maybe one of these two pitches will finally get the Monopoly film out of development hell, or should we say development jail.
- Release Date
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April 4, 2025
- Runtime
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101 minutes
- Director
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Jared Hess
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
