It appears that Steven Spielberg has officially taken it upon himself to finish Stanley Kubrick’s life’s work. The Lincoln director is developing another one of Kubrick’s projects, this time for the small screen. Napoleon is perhaps the most famous of the 2001: A Space Odyssey helmer’s unrealized films, with Kubrick having conducted massive amounts of research for the biopic on the French Emperor, only to see the project canceled due to the hefty cost of location filming.

Kubrick passed away in 1999, leaving a number of projects unfinished. Shortly after the famed director’s death, Spielberg took it upon himself to complete work on A.I. Artificial Intelligence, a film that Kubrick had been working on since the early ’70s. The director consulted with Spielberg before his passing, handing the film off to the Jurassic Park helmer in 1995. But it was Kubrick’s death that ultimately prompted Spielberg to make the film. Now, Spielberg is working on adapting Kubrick’s Napoleon into a television miniseries: "I've been developing Stanley Kubrick's screenplay -- for a miniseries not for a motion picture -- about the life of Napoleon,” Spielberg told the French network Canal+ (via The Playlist). “Kubrick wrote the script in 1961, a long time ago.”

As I mentioned above, Kubrick left behind an enormous amounts of notes, including an entire card catalog of the French Emperor’s movements and deeds throughout the years. There’s even a screenplay, which has since been made available online. I’m sure Spielberg will make the project his own, but it’s nice to know that he has plenty of guidance from the legendary director. I just hope this doesn’t mean that we never see Robocalypse.

If you'd like to check out what Kubrick did on Napoleon, here's a great book that's available on Amazon:

stanley-kubrick-napoleon