Ryan Phillippe to play sniper in TV pilot version of 'Shooter'

Former Secrets and Lies star Ryan Phillippe has picked his next TV project: EW has learned the actor will star in Shooter, a just-greenlit USA pilot where Phillippe will star as a former Marine sniper. The series is based on based on the best-selling Stephen Hunter novel Point of Impact, as well as the 2007 film Shooter starring Mark Wahlberg.

Phillippe (Damages, Flags of Our Fathers) star as Bob Lee Swagger, an “off-the-grid former Marine sniper who is coaxed into action to thwart the killing of the President. Ultimately double-crossed and framed for the attempt, he must call upon all the skills he acquired as a decorated Marine sharpshooter to avoid capture while hunting down and exposing the traitors who set him up.”

Wahlberg, who is a producer on the USA pilot, passed the character to Phillippe in a statement: “I love the character of Bob Lee Swagger and we are thrilled to have Ryan on board for the show.”

Producer details: Stephen Levinson will executive produce. John Hlavin (The Shield) wrote the pilot and will also executive produce. Simon Cellan Jones (Ballers) is set to direct the pilot, which is a co-production between Paramount TV and Universal Cable Productions.