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News > HBO Backs Barry Bonds Biopic

Written by David Morgan

If only HBO started with a B too.

Ron Shelton, a director best known for sports-related movies such as Bull Durham, White Men Can't Jump, Cobb, and Tin Cup, has been tapped by HBO to write and direct a movie about the career of baseball's Barry Bonds. As soon as the strike ends, he and his writing partner John Norville will begin adapting a book by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams called "Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO and the Steroids Scandal That Rocked Professional Sports."

Fainaru-Wada and Williams are a pair of San Francisco Chronicle reporters who, according to Variety, "broke numerous stories about the nutrition company accused of distributing illegal steroids to athletes including Bonds, Oakland A's and New York Yankees first baseman Jason Giambi and Olympic gold medal sprinter Marion Jones."

In the film, the record breaking slugger will be depicted as "a gifted player who made a Faustian bargain to increase his power." No casting announcements have been issued as of yet.