Jack Whitehall gets big Hollywood break joining The Rock in Disney's 'Jungle Cruise'

Jack Whitehall has landed his Hollywood break, with a role in the new Disney movie The Jungle Cruise, opposite Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt.

Whitehall will play Blunt’s brother in the movie, a ‘key role’ according to reports.

The movie, set to roll cameras in May, will be directed by Catalan director Jaume Collet-Serra, who made The Shallows with Blake Lively and The Commuter with Liam Neeson.

It finds Disney once more plumbing its intellectual property to turn one of its famous theme park rides into a movie, following its multiple successes with the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, which has made the Mouse House $4.5 billion over five movies.

The Rock’s production company Seven Bucks, recently responsible for worldwide smash Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle, will co-produce the movie with Disney.

There’s no word yet on how the plot will develop, but the rides, which feature at Disney parks in Florida, California, Tokyo and Hong Kong, find park-goers boarding old fashioned steam boats for a cruise down famous rivers in Asia, Africa and South America.

The ride, which was partially inspired by the classic Humphrey Bogart movie The African Queen, also features a wealth of animatronic animals.

The Rock paid tribute to the “funny and talented” British comic, announcing the casting news on Twitter.

Whitehall is also set to appear in the forthcoming The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, playing the Harlequin alongside the likes of Keira Knightley, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman and Richard E. Grant, due out in November.

It was recently confirmed that Whitehall’s ex-girlfriend, Gemma Chan, is also making her Hollywood debut, having landed a role in the new Captain Marvel movie alongside Brie Larson.

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