Joe Eszterhas, the legendary screenwriter of “Basic Instinct,” the 1992 thriller that defined femme serial killers in film and made an icon of Sharon Stone, has closed a $4 million deal to write a reboot for Scott Stuber’s United Artists banner and Amazon MGM Studios, TheWrap has exclusively learned.

The deal is the biggest spec script sale of the year so far, and commits Amazon to a $2 million payout against a potential $4 million to Eszterhas if the movie is made.

“To those who question what an 80-year-old man is doing writing a sexy, erotic thriller: the rumors of my cinematic impotence are exaggerated and ageist,” Esztherhas said in a statement to TheWrap. “I call my writing partner the TWISTED LITTLE MAN and he lives somewhere deep inside me. He was born 29 and he will die 29 and he tells me he is ‘sky high up’ to write this piece and provide viewers with a wild and orgasmic ride. That makes me very happy.”

Sharon Stone could return as Catherine Tramell in the role that shot her to international stardom. The Eszterhas reboot is expected to be “anti-woke,” according to an individual with knowledge of the deal. While many details of the reboot are yet to be determined, the approach is significant since the original film courted controversy among both feminists and the gay communities.

Nick Nesbitt and Stuber are producing, along with Craig Baumgartern and Adam Griffin, who is executive producing, via their Vault Entertainment banner.

Amazon MGM declined to comment to TheWrap.

The acquisition of the “Basic Instinct” reboot follows Amazon MGM Studios doubling down on its film slate, which includes next year’s big sci-fi adaptation “Project Hail Mary” and the full acquisition of the James Bond rights, with Denis Villeneuve installed as the director of the next 007 entry.

Tramell emerged as post-feminist icon – a successful novelist who was smarter than the cops who were chasing her, had a number of sexual partners and was the coolest person in the room, even if a killer. The scene of Stone as Tramell confidently (without underwear) uncrossing her legs during a police interrogation became an iconic power move. Stone would later claim that the shot was captured without her consent.

Joe Eszterhas at his writing desk with his portrait of Otis Redding(Courtesy of Joe Eszterhas)

When Eszterhas wrote the first “Basic Instinct,” it was in the age of lucrative spec script sales and he was awarded a record $3 million. He would later get $2 million for his “Showgirls” script for “Basic Instinct” director Paul Verhoeven and $2.5 million for a four-page outline for what would eventually become “One Night Stand.” (Eszterhas was so dissatisfied by the movie that he took his name off of it).

His best-selling memoir “Hollywood Animal,” released in 2004, detailed the making of “Basic Instinct.”

Picketers protested the production of the movie in San Francisco after it was learned that Tramell was a queer character, leaning into the heavy stereotype of predatory homosexuals (William Friedkin’s “Cruising” had been picketed for similar reasons.)

The original “Basic Instinct,” a cheeky, sexually explicit riff on Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo,” follows an accused serial killer and novelist Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone, in the role that made her a household name) who has an affair with the detective on the case (Michael Douglas). Full of outlandish twists and incredible technical merits (it was shot by Jan de Bont and has a slinky score by the legendary Jerry Goldsmith), “Basic Instinct” was a smash, making more than $353 million globally on a budget of just $49 million — that’s a box office haul of $800 million adjusted for inflation.

A long-in-the-tooth sequel finally arrived in 2006 without Verhoeven. Scottish filmmaker Michael Canton-Jones stepped in instead of Eszterhas, who had largely stepped away from screenwriting after the disastrous production of 1997’s “An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn.” The “Basic Instinct” sequel was panned by critics and underperformed at the box office, earning only $38.6 million on a budget of more than $70 million. It has returned as something of a cult classic in the years since, based on its tongue-in-cheek dialogue and general outrageousness.

After the disaster of “An Alan Smithee Film,” Eszterhas left Hollywood with his wife, producer Naomi Baka, who he married in 1994, moved to his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, and wrote extensively about his return to his Catholic faith in “Crossbearer: A Memoir of Faith.”

In 2012, a planned collaboration on a Biblical telling of the ancient Jewish Macabee story with Mel Gibson blew up in spectacular fashion. Eszterhas accused Gibson of being unhinged and of egging on antisemitic supporters to attack the screenwriter. At the time, Eszterhas released a recording of an unhinged Mel Gibson raging through his house in Costa Rica which Eszterhas’s son recorded, citing concerns for his safety and the safety of others.

Now 80, his focus has been on being a man of faith and being a father.

Eszterhas and Bloomgarten were repped by Doug Stone of Glaser Weil.