Philip K. Dick, the author whose works have been translated into popular movies such as Blade Runner and Total Recall, as well as the series The Man in the High Castle, is getting the biopic treatment.
Jon Shestack is producing Only Apparently Real, based in part on a biography written by Paul Williams, the onetime literary executor of Dick’s estate and friend of the author. Michael Richter, a former lawyer turned scribe, wrote the script and is also producing.
Dick, who died at the age of 53 in 1982, was a darling of the intellectual science-fiction crowd thanks to his works that had elements of paranoia and explored the nature of reality and perception. While he won a Hugo Award and was nominated several times for Nebula Awards, both major literary recognitions in the worlds of sci-fi and fantasy, it was only after his death that his appreciation and popularity soared and entered the mainstream, thanks to Hollywood adaptations.
His own life was just as mind-bending as his work, filled with drug use and hallucinations, a suicide attempt and letters to the FBI, paranormal experiences and believing he was living parallel lives in two different time periods, one in the present and the other in the Roman Empire.
Only Apparently Real centers on a break-in at Dick’s house that took place in the early ’70s. He was in the midst of his fourth divorce, trying to give up amphetamines, battling writer’s block and possibly being spied on by the United States government. Then his house was ransacked, his safe blown open and his manuscripts were stolen. But then again, maybe they weren’t and maybe there was never a break-in.
“His life was as surreal as his books,” says Shestack. “He was a high-level functioning person and you never know, even when reading his journals, what is real and what isn’t.”
The story also tackles what Dick himself described as a tragic theme that pervaded his life: the death in infancy of his twin sister, Jane, and the reenactment of it over and over again. Dick attributed many of his psychological issues and personal life challenges to her death, including his attachment anxieties.
The producers are on a director hunt with the plan to begin shooting this fall in San Rafael, California, where Dick lived when the break-in occurred. The project is being financed through a blockchain-based DAO, managed by Sam Lessin and Slow Ventures.
Richter wrote and produced the 2013 indie drama Torn starring John Heard and Faran Tahir. Torn won awards for best feature film at the Rhode Island International Film Festival and best film at the Irvine International Film Festival. Richter is also developing a series adaptation based on the novel The Talented Ribkins by Ladee Hubbard and is producing on The Last Adventure of Constance Verity at Legendary, both with Shestack.
Shestack, a veteran producer whose credits range from Harrison Ford thriller Air Force One and Steve Carrell dramedy Dan in Real Life, is currently developing sci-fi thriller Old Man’s War, set up at Netflix, as well Free Radicals, an adaptation of an Alice Munro short story.
