As the start date for production rockets towards them, Ridley Scott and his team are at work in earnest to build up the cast for the adaptation of Andy Weir’s book The Martian. Michael Pena is the latest actor in the director’s sights, and he’s in early negotiations, according to Variety.
Matt Damon will star in the film as NASA astronaut Mark Watney, left stranded on Mars after his crewmates on the Ares 3 mission are forced to evacuate by a dust storm.
Looking to stave off death on the Red Planet, Watney fights for survival, trying to rustle up water and grow crops. Meanwhile, his fellow astronauts are kept in the dark about his survival during their voyage back to Earth on the Hermes spacecraft. NASA struggles to find some way to rescue Watney, while the Hermes astronauts try to help once they finally learn he’s alive.
Pena is apparently trying to figure out whether he’ll have time in his schedule to take a role, but if he does, he’ll join Damon, Kate Mara and, assuming her own deal closes, Jessica Chastain. Kristen Wiig’s name has also been linked with the film, but there’s no word on whether she’s actually going to appear.
As for Pena’s current schedule, he’ll next be seen in David Ayer’s Fury, due on October 22, and is part of the cast for Gracepoint, the US TV show adapted from Broadchurch.