Combat sports fans won’t have to wait much longer to see Conor McGregor back in action … only the action will involve the Irish superstar performing on screen as opposed to in a cage.
The former two-weight UFC champion landed his first feature film role for the upcoming Road House, a remake of the popular 1989 movie of the same name starring Sam Elliott and the late Patrick Swayze. The 2024 version, which stars Jake Gyllenhaal, released its official trailer online Thursday morning and McGregor proudly posted it to his social media channels.
“An ex-UFC middleweight fighter ends up working at a rowdy bar in the Florida Keys where things are not as they seem,” the plot reads, according to IMDb.com.
Several scenes were filmed early in 2023 during UFC 285 fight week in Nevada.
Former UFC and Bellator welterweight Jay Hieron, who competed against Georges St-Pierre, Tyron Woodley and Ben Askren during his MMA career, is also acting in the movie.
Gyllenhaal slapped Hieron in one sequence that took place during the ceremonial weigh-ins — where a fictional UFC 222 weigh-in was set up — and the two filmed a fight sequence between real sanctioned bouts at the UFC 285 event at T-Mobile Arena last March with UFC announcer Bruce Buffer, noted MMA referee Chris Tognoni, plus various members from the UFC staff also involved.
The 2024 movie, an Amazon MGM Studios production, will not be getting a theatrical release. It is instead set for a streaming release on Prime Video on March 21.
Ironically, the film’s director Doug Liman (Edge of Tomorrow, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, The Bourne Identity, Swingers) wrote an op-ed for Deadline this week explaining why he will be boycotting the SXSW premiere of his movie, arguing the big-budget motion picture deserved a release on the big screen and that studio decisions like this are hurting cinemas.
“The movie is fantastic, maybe my best, and I’m sure it will bring the house down and possibly have the audience dancing in their seats during the end credits,” Liman wrote. “But I will not be there. My plan had been to silently protest Amazon’s decision to stream a movie so clearly made for the big screen.”
Hieron’s character is named “Jax Harris,” while McGregor plays “Knox” who based on the trailer is presumably playing one of the villains opposite Gyllenhaal’s protagonist.
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