Will Ferrell is set to play Bobby Riggs in new tennis drama Match Maker.
Riggs was famous during the 1940s as a tennis player, but shot to fame in the seventies when he claimed he could still beat any of the top female tennis players of the time.
Riggs took on then women's world number one Billie Jean King in 1973, in a Battle of the Sexes match in the U.S.
According to Variety.com, the biopic will be based Don Van Natta Jr.'s ESPN story - titled 'The Match Maker: Bobby Riggs, the Mafia and the Battle of the Sexes' - published in August 2013, which alleged that the former champion threw the match against King to settle gambling debts.
Peter Chernin and Jenno Topping will produce via their Chernin Entertainment banner, with Ferrell and Adam McKay through their Gary Sanchez Productions, alongside David Ready and Jessica Elbaum.
Steve Conrad has penned the script for the film, but a director is yet to be named.
Last year documentary Battle of the Sexes hit the big screen, and followed the development of the WTA and the Battle of the Sexes match.
As for Ferrell, he has already completed work on Welcome To Me and is currently filming Get Hard.
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