Jason Statham is getting into the self-referential Hollywood star game, having reportedly signed on to star as, well, Jason Statham—specifically, in David Leitch’s upcoming action-comedy Jason Statham Stole My Bike. Per Deadline, there’s no word about what the plot of the upcoming movie will be, but we could probably assay a few guesses, vis-á-vis bikes, Stathams, and who might be stealing which.
Honestly, the real takeaway here is that Leitch is making another big-budget action movie, big news for those of us who got a serious kick out of his 2024 stuntperson love letter The Fall Guy. Although JSSMB is being set up as an indie film—it’s currently being shopped at Berlin’s European Film Market—it’s one that’ll apparently tout a hefty budget of $80 million, with a promise of a lot of action-heavy setpieces from the Bullet Train and Deadpool 2 director. The film brings Statham and Leitch back together after the heady days of Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs And Shaw, and features a script from Alison Flierl, a former Conan writer best known for comedy work. (Including, we can’t help but note in passing, writing the script for one of the very best comedy-focused episodes of BoJack Horseman.)
And, sure, the “famous movie star plays a version of himself” conceit has seen a lot of play in recent years, most recently with Nicolas Cage’s role as “Nick Cage” in 2022’s The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent. But Statham—who, it’s worth remembering, got his start as the guy who gets his ass kicked in movies like Snatch, rather than the other way around—has always seemed to have a good degree of self-awareness about the ridiculousness of his movie star persona, and a decent handle on how to mine comedy from the extremely self-serious, bee-covered dudes he plays in more modern flicks.
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