They're Making a Movie About Flamin' Hot Cheetos Now

There's a Cheetos movie on the way—though, sadly, we're not getting a heist flick about Chester Cheetah trying to steal a truckload of puffs. According to Variety, FOX Searchlight has announced plans to produce a new biopic about Richard Montanez, the man who invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos and single-handedly inspired people around the world to start dousing their Cheetos in lime juice.

The Flamin' Hot Cheetos origin story is actually pretty incredible. Back in 1976, Montanez was working as a janitor in a California Frito-Lay factory when he decided to smuggle a few unseasoned Cheetos puffs home and experiment with some spices of his own.

"I see the corn man adding butter, cheese, and chile to the corn," Montanez recalled in a 2012 interview with FOX News, "and thought, what if I add chile to a Cheeto?"

His friends and family all loved his homemade spicy Cheetos recipe, so Montanez decided to bring the idea all the way to the top. He scored a sit-down with the Frito-Lay president and spent two weeks crafting a pitch, even designing his own prototype packaging, according to his interview with FOX News. Frito-Lay's top brass fell in love with the spicy snack, and the rest is history.

The new biopic, called Flamin' Hot, will be written by Lewis Colick (October Sky) and will likely follow Montanez's Horatio Alger–style rise from janitor to spicy snack genius to top exec at PepsiCo, where he works today. FOX Searchlight will produce, alongside DeVon Franklin, who reportedly developed the idea for the film with Colick and Montanez himself.

The movie's still in the very early stages of development, so there's no telling who will sign on to star, but hopefully Oscar Isaac will at least get a chance to sneak in for a cameo—the guy is a well-known Flamin' Hot Cheetos fanboy.

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