Earlier this year we got the surprising news that Margot Robbie would be lacing up her ice skates for a role as disgraced figure skater Tonya Harding in an upcoming biopic titled I,Tonya. While nobody has been cast as Harding's thuggish husband Jeff Gillooly yet, we do know who will be directing the film, and it will be The Finest Hours' Craig Gillespie.
Gillespie, whose best work remains Lars and the Real Girl and the Fright Night remake, will direct his second sports-based movie after 2014's Million Dollar Arm. I, Tonya is based on a spec script by Steve Rogers that takes a look at Harding's troubled upbringing, rise to figure skating fame in 1991 when she won the U.S. Championships, and involvement in the 1994 attack on her rival, Nancy Kerrigan. Harding was part of a plot that saw Gillooly and a group of friends bash Kerrigan's knee in hopes of breaking her leg. They failed and Kerrigan went on to skate at the 1994 Olympics, earning a silver medal while Harding finished a distant eighth. She eventually admitted involvement in the attack and was stripped of her titles.
Gillespie's been treading water as a director for a while but hopefully this can turn things around. It's amazing that Harding's story has never been turned into a movie before, but the wait got us Robbie in the lead so it was worth it.
