From Daily Variety, September 16, 1997, Page 1
DICAPRIO INKS 'BOMBSHELL'
By: Michael Fleming

Leonardo DiCaprio has agreed to play Theodore Hall, the most influential yet least known man of the 20th century.  DiCaprio is attached to star in the screen version of "Bombshell: The Secret Story of America's Unknown Atomic Spy Conspiracy".

The upcoming book by Joseph Albright and Marcia Kunstel will be published this fall by Times Books/Random House.  Hall is the genius teenage biophysicist who was the youngest participant in the development of the atomic bomb; he also passed highly classified data to the Soviet Union. Some say he was singlehandedly responsible for causing the Cold War.

Surprisingly, while Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed for a similar treason, Hall and his co-conspirator, Saville Sax, got away with it until 1995, when their names were uncovered in Soviet intelligence messages released by the National Security Agency. Their identities were sniffed out by the authors, who were Moscow-based newspaper correspondents.

The book was optioned by Addis/Wechsler, with Nick Wechsler, Julia Chasman, Rick Yorn, George DiCaprio and Mary Salter signed up to produce. Salter, who has partnered on projects with Meryl Streep, showed the book to the actress, who suggested her "Marvin's Room" co-star as the perfect candidate to play the boy genius.

Salter then brought it to Yorn, DiCaprio's manager at Addis-Wechsler, who got the process started with George DiCaprio, Leonardo's father. CAA's Kevin Huvane is repping the package, and they're in talks with an A-list director. Once the lenser is aboard, they'll shop the project to studios. As turncoats go, this one is a lot different than the notorious CIA traitor, Aldrich Ames, whose story is being done by Fox 2000.

Ames benefitted financially for giving up Soviet-based U.S. spies to be killed. Hall never took a penny and gave away perhaps the most valuable espionage secrets the Soviets ever  obtained.

He did it, he claims now, because he felt that if such  a powerful weapon remained in the hands of one side, the lack of nuclear parity increased the chances that one might actually be set off. Now 71, ill and living in London, Hall is trying to somewhat change the perception of his place in history.

DiCaprio, who'll next be seen starring in James Cameron's "Titanic", recently wrapped dual starring roles in "The Main in the Iron Mask". He's currently shooting a movie for Woody Allen, and is attached to another true story, "The Inside Man", a film being written and to be directed by Michael Mann.