Ryan Gosling could be making a hard gear shift from Barbie-pink Ken to be lead a new Star Wars movie

For some, Ryan Gosling will always be Noah from The Notebook to many but to others, he is the actor who transcended the romantic lead to pursued a raft of smaller projects from interesting filmmakers.

In between starring in projects like Lars and the Real Girl, Half Nelson and Song to Song, Gosling has taken on big studio projects including Barbie, Blade Runner 2049 and La La Land.

But it doesn’t get bigger than a Star Wars movie.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Gosling is in negotiations to join Shawn Levy’s upcoming Star Wars film as the lead.

Details are scant but Levy has been developing the film for more than two years and it is expected to be a standalone movie rather than a trilogy. THR reported that if Gosling signs on, the project would then be fast-tracked and could start filming as soon as later this year.

Levy directed the box office hit Deadpool & Wolverine and is best known for comedic films such as Night at the Museum and Date Night, so Gosling’s comic timing could be a good fit.

Gosling was most recently in The Fall Guy, a stunts-heavy blockbuster shot in Sydney, and will next be seen in Project Hail Mary, a sci-fi film written by Drew Goddard and adapted from Andy Weir’s book (which was the creative combination behind The Martian).

Star Wars has had a patchy recent history on the big screen with the most release in 2019 with The Rise of Skywalker, which made more than a $US1 billion, but was not critically well-received.

Its big screen projects have, since then, faltered with a series of stop-starts and projects that were announced by later cancelled or stalled.

Among the elephants’ graveyard of never-was Star Wars movies include a trilogy from Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, and films from Marvel boss Kevin Feige and Loki writer Michael Waldron, Patty Jenkins, Damon Lindelof and Guillermo del Toro.

A trilogy from The Last Jedi’s Rian Johnson is not officially cancelled but there hasn’t been any movement on it since it was announced in 2017, and everything has gone quiet on Taika Waititi’s.

The other Star Wars movies that are, in theory, still happening include a Jedi origins story from James Mangold (Logan and A Complete Unknown), a Simon Kinberg-penned trilogy and Donald Glover’s Lando Calrissian spin-off.

Sequel films to star Daisy Ridley’s Rey has been delayed after writer Steven Knight left the project late last year.

The only one in production and slated for a May 2026 release is Mandalorian & Grogu from Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni.