EXCLUSIVE: Before its highly-anticipated Charlize Theron thriller, Apex bows later this spring, Netflix and Chernin Entertainment have already found their next project for director Baltasar Kormákur which will team him up with a familiar face. Sources tell Deadline, Mark Wahlberg and Riz Ahmed are set to star in the Netflix and Chernin thriller The Big Fix, with Kormákur on board to direct. Guy Bolton and Justin Haythe are penning the script with Kormákur producing along with Peter Chernin and David Ready for Chernin.
Inspired by a true story, The Big Fix follows a former Interpol cop in a bureaucratic role at FIFA who uncovers an international match-fixing scandal and launches a high-stakes mission to stop whoever is behind it. His target: a passionate hustler who joins forces with Chinese Triads to earn millions of dollars rigging football games across the world. As they start to circle one another, a high-octane, globetrotting cat-and-mouse thriller ensues – pitting two defiant, determined men against each other.
Bennett Walsh and Jenno Topping will exec produce.
One of Netflix’s big swings for the first half of 2026 is the upcoming survival thriller Apex, which Kormakur directed with Theron Taron Egerton starring. Netflix and Chernin are high on the pic and even before shooting wrapped were throwing around some ideas of what he may want to direct next, finally landing on The Big Fix, which has been a high priority for Chernin and Netflix exec Kira Goldberg going back to when the two were developing during her time at 20th Century Fox.
Once Kormákur was on board, the next step was tapping the two leads at the center of this story. Wahlberg and Kormákur go way back with the A-lister starring in the director’s first major studio film Contraband as well as the hit action pic Two Guns and this film felt like the perfect fit for the two to reunite. As for Ahmed, the Oscar-winner is coming off a strong year that included the rave reviews for the thriller Relay, and felt like the perfect fit opposite Wahlberg.
With both actors on board, the project is set to gain some serious momentum as it goes into production later this year.
Wahlberg was most recently seen in The Family Plan 2. Ahmed can be seen next in Alejandro Irranitu’s next film Digger.
Wahlberg is repped by WME and Leverage Management, Ahmed is repped by WME and Kormákur is repped by Range Media Partners and CAA.
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‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source deadline.com ’
