Beyond the Sea (film) west conducted arbitration through the scripts that had been written since Barry Levinson developed the film at Warner Bros. in 1987. Lewis Colick, James Toback and Tom Epperson disassociated themselves for credit by the WGA. The Guild justified credit to Lewis Colick, who wrote the first draft of "The Bobby Darin Story" in 1987, and Kevin Spacey. Actor-writer Jeffrey Meek believed he should have deserved credit; he was paid $85,000 of a promised $125,000 to settle his claim to have performed writing services. Spacey said Meek was "not a hired writer" on "Beyond the Sea". "He turned in a draft,
Rebel in the Rye Luckinbill would produce the film along with Bruce Cohen, Jason Shuman, and Strong. On August 31, 2015, Nicholas Hoult was cast in the biopic to play Salinger, and the film was re-titled as "Rebel in the Rye". On January 19, 2016, Kevin Spacey joined the film to play Whit Burnett, a lecturer at Columbia University, editor of the "Story" magazine, and a mentor of the young Salinger. On February 12, 2016, Laura Dern, Brian d'Arcy James, and Hope Davis signed on to star in the film for unspecified roles. On March 9, 2016, Zoey Deutch joined the film to play