Real Pirate Of The Caribbean Gets A Movie

From cinemablend, Apparently DreamWorks has been paying attention to the way people continue to be obsessed with pirates, even though Pirates of the Caribbean is done for now and let’s face it, those last two movies weren’t really that good. That doesn’t matter to the thousands and thousands of you who routinely throw yourself at our comments section, proclaiming your love of all things piratey. DreamWorks doesn’t have Captain Jack Sparrow, he belongs to Disney, so they’re going for the next best thing: The real deal. Instead of making a movie about the worst pirate ever, they’re making a movie about the best known pirate ever, with a biopic about Blackbeard.

Variety says David Franzoni, the writer of Amistad and Gladiator is writing it for them, collaborating with Pat Croce, a rich guy who happens to own a pirate museum in key west, and fantasizes about wearing parrots as shoulder decoration.

Blackbeard, born in England as Edward Teach, sailed the Caribbean in the 18th century. He captained the Queen Anne’s Revenge, and when you think of a stereotypical pirate his image is probably the one you’ve got stuck in your head. The details of his life are somewhat sketchy, which should leave plenty of room for Hollywood embellishment in DreamWorks’ movie. He did plunder merchant ships, but beyond that it’s mostly legend and speculation.

Oddly enough, at one point it was Blackbeard who was the centerpiece of Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean ride. That lasted until the popularity of the movies, when he was removed and replaced by Barbossa. Don’t feel bad for him though, he’s been a movie star himself almost since the early 50s. He’s been in a handful of different movies since then, most notably the 1968 film Blackbeards Ghost, in which he was played by the great Peter Ustinov.