Taika Waititi to Adapt Soccer Documentary ‘Next Goal Wins’ for Fox Searchlight

Waititi will direct, and write with Iain Morris

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Taika Waitit has set up his next project, an adaptation of the 2014 soccer documentary “Next Goal Wins” for Fox Searchlight, an individual close to the production told TheWrap.

The original documentary followed the national football team of American Samoa as they tried to bounce back from being known as one of the world’s weakest to qualify for the 2014 FIFA World Cup with the help of Dutch-born, America-based coach Thomas Rongen.

Waititi will direct the film, and write it alongside Iain Morris. The project comes from Andy Serkis’ Imaginarium Productions, which optioned the documentary by Mike Brett and Steve Jamison in 2015. Waititi is producing alongside Serkis, Jonathan Cavendish, Garrett Basch, Brett and Jamison.

Waititi is expected to squeeze in “Next Goal Wins” before he shoots “Thor: Love and Thunder” as part of Marvel’s Phase 4. Natalie Portman will return to the franchise as Thor, Goddess of Thunder, in the film, the first in the series since 2017’s Waititi-directed “Thor: Ragnarok.”

Waititi recently wrapped production on the satirical comedy “Jojo Rabbit,” which will premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival and open wide on Oct. 18. The “anti-hate satire” follows a lonely German boy — Jojo “Rabbit” Betzler– during World War II who discovers that his single mother is hiding a young Jewish girl.

He must then confront his blind nationalism with the help of his imaginary friend, an idiotic version of Adolf Hitler. It stars Waititi as Hitler with Sam Rockwell, Scarlett Johansson, Rebel Wilson, Alfie Allen, Stephen Merchant, Thomasin McKenzie and Roman Griffin Davis as Jojo.

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