Playwright-couple Mark Rylance, Claire van Kampen join hands with Steven Spielberg for new TV project

LOS ANGELES: Oscar winner Mark Rylance and his playwright-wife Claire van Kampen have joined hands with master filmmaker Steven Spielberg and his Amblin Entertainment for a television project. Rylance has worked with Spielberg in "The BFG" (2016) and "Bridge of Spies" (2015), which won him an Academy Award for best supporting actor.

The actor made the revelation at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado over the weekend, reported entertainment website Deadline.

"It's a historical project, about something that happened in American history," Rylance said.


The drama with Spielberg is under wraps, he added, without divulging details.

The actor said he had been working on the project as a play for a while.

"... and now I've suddenly realised that it could be a TV thing, and (Spielberg) agrees," Rylance said.

He added that he and van Kampen, who are close friends with Spielberg, have completed the treatment of the first episode.

According to Deadline, the TV drama will, in part, explore the Battle of Homestead, an industrial lockout and strike which began on July 1, 1892, culminating in a battle between strikers and private security agents on July 6, 1892. It was a pivotal event in US labour history.

Rylance currently stars in director Luca Guadagnino's cannibal drama "Bones and All", alongside Timothee Chalamet and Taylor Russell. The film also received its world premiere at the ongoing Venice Film Festival last Friday.