Apr 22, 2016 03:46 PM EDT
Batman actor Michael Keaton's next project, biopic The Founder, just got its first trailer, and so far his take on McDonald's founder Ray Kroc looks pretty great.
Keaton is on a roll right now: after his big Oscar-nominated comeback in Birdman, the actor followed up with his second Best Picture winner, Spotlight -- and it looks like he has another hit in his hands!
The first trailer for the film was revealed through USA Today last Thursday, and so far, so good. The film, which opens with the question of how a "52-year-old, over-the-hill milkshake machine salesman" ended up building the biggest restaurant chain in the world, gets viewers front row tickets to see the beginnings of the fast food industry.
In the trailer, we are introduced to Keaton's Kroc when he's doing his sales rounds and visits the two McDonald brothers, Mac (played by John Carroll Lynch) and Dick (Nick Offerman), who have created a new system to make burgers and make 'em fast. Kroc is impressed with the McDonalds' revolutionary business model and he pushes to become a partner and expand and franchise.
In the first clip, Keaton drops a few pearls of wisdom like how "McDonald's can be the new American church, and it ain't just open on Sundays" and that "contracts are like hearts: they're meant to be broken." Much like Leonardo DiCaprio's role in The Wolf of Wall Street, it seems the "hero" of this story will be presented as a charming but awful person -- and one who's breaking the fourth wall, too.
The Founder has a pretty impressive cast led by Keaton and also including Linda Cardellini, Patrick Wilson and Laura Dern, all working from a screenplay written by Robert D. Siegel, the man behind The Wrestler. The film's director is John Lee Hancock, whose most recent film, Saving Mr. Banks, was also about an unlikable hero: Mary Poppins creator P.L. Travers.
The Founder will come out in theaters on Aug. 5.
