Glen Powell’s a Busy Man
Glen Powell’s dance card is getting awfully full. Powell, who broke out in Top Gun: Maverick and then cemented his status as a rising star with chemistry to spare starring opposite Sydney Sweeney in the romantic comedy Anyone But You, has a slew of upcoming films set to release this summer and a slate of incredible projects he’s attached to.
Powell can next be seen in Richard Linklater’s critically acclaimed Hit Man (June 7), followed by Lee Isaac Chung’s action-epic Twisters (July 19). He also produced The Blue Angels alongside J.J. Abrams (which hits IMAX on May 17, then streams on Prime Video on May 23), which follows the Navy’s Flight Demonstration Squadron for a year.
As for Powell’s near future, it’s unsurprisingly bright. The Hollywood Reporter scoops that he will be re-teaming with Abrams on a new project that will be the director’s next film, although details are being kept under wraps for now. THR also reported yesterday that Powell will star opposite Laura Dern and Anthony Mackie in director John Lee Hancock’s legal drama Monsanto, which tells the story of a young, untested attorney, Brent Wisner (Powell), who takes on the U.S. chemical colossus Monsanto on behalf of Dewayne “Lee” Johnson (Mackie), who used the company’s best-stelling pesticide Roundup for his job and ended up getting sick.
Then there’s The Running Man, writer/director Edgar Wright’s reboot of the 1987 film that was based on a Stephen King novel. The story is set in a totalitarian America in 2025 in which the most popular show (the titular Running Man) televises the plight of contestants fleeing teams of killers for cash; the longer they survive, the more money they make. King’s story was first adapted in 1987 in a film by Paul Michael Glaser and starring none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger.
In Linklater’s upcoming Netflix film Hit Man, Powell plays Gary Johnson, a part-time teacher who works as a tech consultant for the New Orleans Police Department, helping them record sting operations. Without a nary a minute of training, Gary’s tasked with a last-minute assignment by the NOPD: go undercover and impersonate a contract killer. Gary takes to the role perhaps a little too well and soon becomes the NOPD’s go-to guy when it comes to impersonating the type of man who will kill for money. The desk jockey becomes an undercover agent, a dream many a dweeb can relate to.
In Chung’s Twisters, Powell plays Tyler Owens, a social media maverick who has built his social stardom by sharing his death-defying twister experiences with his many followers; the more ferocious the twister, the more fans Owens whips into a frenzy. He stars opposite Daisy Edgar-Jones and Anthony Ramos.
Powell’s career has certainly been swept up, but in the best way possible.
Featured image: PARK CITY, UTAH – JANUARY 22: Glen Powell speaks during Netflix’s ‘Hit Man’ Sundance Film Festival premiere on January 22, 2024 in Park City, Utah. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images for NETFLIX)
