Armando Iannucci has confirmed that the long-awaited Alan Partridge movie will begin shooting later this year.
The writer, who will act as executive producer on the film, told Empire that Father Ted director Declan Lowney will oversee the fictitious Norwich DJ’s big-screen debut.
"It's just about all come together now, so that'll be shot later in the year," said Iannucci, who co-created Partridge with Steve Coogan, Richard Herring and Stewart Lee.
He also revealed that the film will likely be released in 2013 and disclosed its preliminary title.
“At the moment it’s The Alan Partridge Movie but that’s just a working title. [The script] is written [but] we’re always rewriting, rewriting and rewriting," he said.
The storyline for the new film was apparently finished in January 2012, and Iannucci hinted in 2010 that it will not feature any major curve balls, such as Partridge visiting America.
“The ideas we’ve come up with are very much Alan in the UK and his ideas of what he could be. We don’t see Alan, for example, getting Simon Cowell’s spot on American Idol and going over there. That’s too good for Alan. Alan’s future is always brighter in his head than it is in the real world,” said the writer.
Filming began on a second series of Alan Partridge’s Mid Morning Matters this February, which will be aired on Sky Atlantic once it is completed.