Gladiator 2 Gets Promising Update From Star Paul Mescal

By Russ Burlingame

Paul Mescal, best known for his role in Normal People, has been tapped to head up the sequel to Ridley Scott's Oscar-winning epic Gladiator, with Scott set to return to direct from a script by David Scarpa. It has been about five years since serious reports about a sequel to Ridley Scott's Gladiator started to circulate, with the script being finished last spring, but according to the star, the film is closer to being a reality than ever before. In fact, it will shoot this year, and the actor is already in the process of beefing up for the role. 

Back in 2021, Scott said that the sequel would be ready to go as his next feature film, but he had to finish Kitbag, a Napoleon biopic featuring Gladiator baddie Joaquin Phoenix, first. 

The film starts shooting "In the summer," Mescal told Deadline. "I'm not sure exactly what the start date is, but soon."

You can see a clip of the interview below.

"First of all, I love doing period films. I love the research. I love to create sort of smells of the period," Scott said back in November."I think what we did with the first Gladiator…I don't like being critical of other things that have happened before, but I wasn't the biggest fan of Hollywood Roman epics, honestly. They felt artificial and so, when I was asked to consider a script, the script was not very good. But the person who gave it to me said, I want to show you one thing, and he picked up an illustration, this is true, it's called For Those About to Die by Gérôme. He holds it up. It's a picture of this big painting of the Coliseum, and in the corner there is this guy, about to tuna fork this poor bastard," Scott added. "He's got this thing in his neck, and he's looking up for permission to kill. I went, bloody hell, that's never been done properly before. Never. I said, I'll do it. He said you will? I said yes. Did you want to read the script? I said no, and we went off and hit the ground running around the table, and evolved the new material."

Not returning for the film will be original star Russell Crowe.

"Yeah we've had dinner and talked about it and all that stuff. So I know roughly how he's shaping the story," Crowe said recently. "But yeah, if you remember, there was a young kid who wanted to beat the Gladiator, which leads to the 'My name is' speech. So that young kid has grown up, and he's now the Emperor. I don't know what else happens at that point, so that's the idea. So it's not a remake. And it's not a direct sequel. It's not like the day after, you know, 30 years later or something."

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