Tom Holland and Austin Butler to play race car-driving brothers in true crime drama ‘American Speed’
Tom Holland and Austin Butler are getting behind the wheel together. The in-demand actors have signed on to play real-life brothers who were race car drivers and crooks in “American Speed,” a film package that just sold to Amazon MGM Studios, according to Deadline.
Holland (the Spider-Man films) and Butler (Academy Award nominee for “Elvis”) will play two of the three Whittington brothers, who were star race car drivers in the ‘70s and ‘80s. Two of the brothers, Don and Bill, got caught up in a scandal at the IMSA Motorsport Association, where their team was funding their racing activities with money earned from marijuana smuggling. Their story lends itself to a “Scarface”-era period piece with fast cars, fast boats, lots of money, and a rise-and-fall narrative, or “Blow” meets “The Iron Claw.”
Dan Wiedenhaupt (“Alpha”) is writing the screenplay. Oscar-winning producer Charles Roven (Oppenheimer) is producing via his Atlas Entertainment banner alongside luxury car dealer RD Whittington and Douglas Banker. Holland previously appeared on Whttington’s reality series, “Million Dollar Wheels.”
This is Holland’s third project announced in the past couple of weeks. He is also reportedly starring in Christopher Nolan’s next movie alongside Matt Damon, and he will reprise his role as Peter Parker in the fourth Spider-Man movie, which is slated for July 2026.
Butler will next be seen in Darren Aronofsky’s thriller “Caught Stealing.” Previously in 2024, he appeared in the crime drama “The Bikeriders,” the Word War II limited series “Masters of the Air,” and the sci-fi hit “Dune 2.”