From School Of Rock director Richard Linklater

School Of Rock director Richard Linklater is developing a biopic of Bill Hicks.

The Hollywood veteran is an avowed fan of the firebrand comedians and has said: ‘There’s not quite any others like him. They don’t speak in the same voice. You’d think people would take that torch and go with it, but it’s a rare combination of that kind of intelligence, mysticism, political, you know… his politics, his angle, it’s pretty unique.’

No further details of the project are known, including the titlte, but the website Collider, which broke the news, said the film would be produced by Focus Features,

Hicks was previously the subject of a 2009 documentary American: The Bill Hicks Story, based around archive footage and interviews with friends, family and colleagues.

And Russell Crowe has long been linked to a possible separate Hicks biopic, either as star or director, although that project has never materialised.

February will be the 25th anniversary of Hicks’s death from pancreatic cancer at the age of 32.

Published: 25 Oct 2018