Ansel Elgort Offered Lead Role in The Goldfinch

The film adaptation of Donna Tartt’s novel The Goldfinch needed a young actor who could play an art thief. They seem to have decided that a young man who can play a getaway driver was close enough.

Ansel Elgort has reportedly been offered the role of Theodore Decker, the protagonist of Tartt’s acclaimed adventure. The film’s director, John Crowley (Brooklyn), met with actors for two months before settling on Elgort for the role. In the novel, Decker is a young man whose mother is killed in a terrorist attack. He ends up living with his father and forging art after a series of misadventures. Variety reports that Anselgort had been looking his next big commercial role following this summer’s Baby Driver.

The adaptation is financed by Warner Bros., Amazon Studios and Brett Ratner’s RatPac. The film will go into production at the beginning of next year.