Dwayne Johnson hopes to start shooting his ‘Black Adam’ movie in "about a year".
The 46-year-old actor – who served as an executive producer on the latest DC Extended Universe film ‘Shazam!’ – is playing Black Adam in an upcoming movie based upon the character, who is a recurring enemy of superhero Shazam in the comic book series.
Johnson has been developing the project for the past 10 years but he has now revealed that filming is set to begin in the next 12 months and he can’t wait to get started.
Speaking in an Instagram video, he said: "The challenges and the struggle that we were having and that was gnawing at my gut is that we were trying to tell two origin stories in one script.
"Those who know the comic books and the mythology of the comics of ‘Shazam!’ know that Shazam is connected to Black Adam.
"Black Adam is an anti-hero, or villain, who I cannot wait to play. I’ve been developing this, and it’s been with me and my DNA for over 10 years now. We should start shooting that in about a year. Very excited about that.
Elsewhere in the video, the ‘Baywatch’ star thanked his fans for their positive response to ‘Shazam!’ – which stars Zachary Levi as the titular hero – which has so far banked $158 million worldwide and has been lauded by critics.
He said: "This is a very big package of gratitude being delivered to you guys, I’m always saying thank you for something but I’m very grateful today so thank you. We had a defining moment at the box office this weekend where we launched a movie that I helped produce called ‘Shazam!’ and you guys have made it a really big success around the world a box office success I wanna say thank you guys so much for making us number one."
Black Adam was originally slated to appear in the ‘Shazam!’ movie but director, David F. Sandberg decided against making the character the main villain because he needed his own origin story and he wanted his film to be "about Shazam".
The movie’s antagonist was Dr. Sivana, played by Mark Strong.