Stephen Hawking To Become A Movie Star

Acclaimed British physicist Stephen Hawking will reportedly trade in scientific journals for the big screen by starring in a movie.

The film, "Beyond the Horizon," aims to explain some of the complicated theories backed by Hawking and his fellow physicists, including the idea that space has up to 11 dimensions and the cause of the big bang.

The 64-year-old Hawking, famous for his 1988 international best-seller "A Brief History of Time," will also narrate a soundtrack which explains cosmological concepts.

"Beyond the Horizon" centres around a fictional religious affairs correspondent for The Times newspaper who approaches Hawking, interviewing the physicist for a major feature.

Leonard Mlodinow, a former scriptwriter on the television series "Star Trek," is working with Hawking on the project, which does not yet have a release date, The Sunday Times said.

The academic, who is the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge -- a post once held by Isaac Newton -- was diagnosed with the muscle-wasting condition motor neurone disease at the age of 22. He is in a wheelchair and speaks with the aid of a computer and voice synthesiser.

His research has centred on theoretical cosmology and quantum gravity, looking at the nature of such subjects as space-time, the "Big Bang" theory and black holes.

Copyright © 2006 Agence France Presse.

Also read Ben Stein's explanation Why you'll never get rich studying African feminism in the 19th century