Paramount and J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot have acquired the film rights to "Cycle of Lies: the Fall of Lance Armstrong," a book proposal about the disgraced cyclist by New York Times reporter Juliet Macur, according to two individuals with knowledge of the deal.
Macur has written about Armstrong for more than a decade, covering his recovery from testicular cancer, his seven consecutive Tour de France titles and ongoing speculation about his use of performance enhancing drugs.
After years of strident denials, Armstrong capitulated this month, sitting down with Oprah Winfrey for a marathon interview on Winfrey's titular network. The first part ran Thursday night; it completes on Friday night
For the first time, Armstrong admitted to Winfrey that he'd used a cocktail of drugs for all seven of his wins and apologized for the years of deception.
There have been many potential projects between Armstrong and Hollywood, including one at Sony, but none ever made it to production.
It remains unclear what role Bad Robot's principals Abrams and Bryan Burk will play, but on past company projects that Abrams did not direct, such as "Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol" and "Morning Glory," both Burk and Abrams produced.
Paramount declined to comment.
