MNN - Mother Nature Network

Matt Damon might want to start biking to film sets. 

 

The 42-year-old actor is rumored to be at the top of a list of actors being considered by J.J. Abrams to play the disgraced 41-year-old Lance Armstrong in a movie about his epic rise and fall. The film would be based on a book set to be published in June by New York Times sports reporter Juliet Macur titled "Cycle Of Lies: The Fall Of Lance Armstrong." According to Deadline, Macur has covered Armstrong for more than a decade — from his comeback from cancer to his confession last week to drug use. Paramount Pictures and Bad Robot partners Abrams and Bryan Burk were the first to scoop up the film rights. 

 

Damon has long been considered a contender to play Armstrong ever since Sony Pictures acquired the rights to the cyclist's 2001 autobiography, “It’s Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life." But then Jake Gyllenhaal announced that he was interested too, started training with Lance, and Sony was reportedly all "yea, that's awesome, let's do this." Unfortunately, that project is rumored to be dead in the wake of Armstrong's crash and burn. 

 

Another actor that's rumored to have been approached by Abrams and Co. is Matthew McConaughey. The 43-year-old, who counts Armstrong as a close friend, was initially pi**ed off upon hearing his confession. 

 

"My first reaction was I was pi**ed off. I was mad," he told MTV News at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. "I then got kind of sad for him. First off, I had a part of me that took it kind of personally, which I think a lot of people have.

 

"For him, it was impersonal because he was living a lie. It was a whole unanimous facade he had to carry around."

 

He continued: "What I realized is that those of us that took that personally, like, 'Oh, he lied to me,' it's not true. 

 

"What I mean by this is, what was he supposed to do? Call me to the side and go, 'Hey man, I did it but don't tell anybody.' Then I would have really had a reason to be pi**ed off at him, going, 'You want me to walk around holding this?'"