Steven Soderbergh may direct The Man From U.N.C.L.E. big screen adaptation

Steven Soderbergh is in talks to take over directing duties on the long-in-development film adaptation of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. at Warner Bros., THR reports. Scott Z. Burns, who wrote Soderbergh’s The Informant and the director’s upcoming medical thriller Contagion, is negotiating to write a new script for the project.

The Man From U.N.C.L.E. television series has been in development at Warner Bros. since the 1990s, most recently with Max Borenstein writing a script to be directed by David Dobkin, who is now moving to the role of producer, along with John Davis.

U.N.C.L.E. aired on NBC from 1964-68, and was co-created by James Bond author Ian Fleming. It centered on the adventures of American and Russian members of a secret agency called the United Network Command for Law and Enforcement, that fought the enemies of peace, particularly the forces of THRUSH.

Dobkin was reportedly going the action-comedy route for the project, but Soderbergh’s varied resume, from Erin Brockovich and Ocean’s Eleven, to Traffic and Solaris, leave things wide open.

Soderbergh just completed an action film called Haywire, with Channing Tatum, Michael Fassbender, Ewan McGregor and Michael Douglas, and is shooting Contagion with Matt Damon, Jude Law and Kate Winslett, among others. He’s looking to shoot Man From U.N.C.L.E. at the end of next year.