Updated June 8

It appears that Mr. Byrne may not be officially attached to the new film helmed by Costa-Gavras quite yet. The Irish Film and Television Network reports:

A representative from Gabriel Byrne’s camp said that they were currently in talks with the KG Productions project although nothing had been locked down as of yet.

So, now is the time to cross your fingers and hope that he does take on this new project. It sounds very intriguing!

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Gabriel Byrne has signed to do two new films:

1. Agatha Christie’s novel The Crooked House will be directed by Neil LaBute, with a screenplay adapted by Julian Fellowes, of Gosford Park and Downton Abbey fame.

A report from Cannes 2011 in The Guardian:

Matthew Goode, who played Charles Ryder in the 2008 film of Brideshead Revisited, is to play Charles Hayward, with Gemma Arterton – who last year charmed Cannes with her performance in the title role of Tamara Drewe – as Sophia. Julie Andrews will play Aristide’s bitter, repressed sister-in-law Edith de Haviland, and Gabriel Byrne, Sophia’s elder brother Roger. The film is set to start shooting in September.

More reports at Variety and IndieWire.

LaBute’s film of A. S. Byatt’s novel Possession was wonderful and his treatment of that book leads us to believe he will do something intriguing (and macabre, of course) with this new work. Let the anticipation begin!

2. A new film, Le Capital, by renowned director Costa-Gavras, based on the novel by Stéphane Osmont—with further inspiration from the essay “Total Capitalism” by former Credit Lyonnais president Jean Peyrelevade— is in the works. Gabriel made a film with Costa-Gavras in 1983. Can you remember the title?

Variety reports:

Costa Gavras will direct banking drama “Capital,” with Mathieu Kassovitz and Gabriel Byrne attached to star.

“Capital” is co-written by Costa Gavras, his director son Romain Gavras, Jean-Claude Grumberg and Karim Boukercha, who co-wrote Romain Gavras’ “Our Day Will Come.”

It adapts Stephane Osmont’s satirical novel, published in 2004.

Kassovitz plays the topper at Europe’s Phoenix Bank, the target of a hostile takeover by U.S. hedge funds. Byrne plays a representative of Phoenix’s new shareholders,

Budgeted at €8 million ($11.4 million), “Capital” is skedded to shoot in late September in Paris, London, Miami, New York and perhaps Tokyo.

Read more about this new film at IndieWire (which reports that Naomi Campbell may have a role as well!). A 2009 interview in The Guardian is worth reading, too!

The maker of Z, State of Siege, Missing and, as you guessed, I’m sure, Hanna K