Lance Armstrong biopic: Ben Foster to star as disgraced cyclist in Stephen Frears biopic

Chris O'Dowd will play the journalist who exposed the cyclist

Ben Foster is set to star as Lance Armstrong (Getty Images)

Ben Foster is set to star as Lance Armstrong in a forthcoming biopic of the disgraced cyclist by British director Stephen Frears.

Foster, 32, will be familiar to viewers of Six Feet Under, and he stars in the upcoming Daniel Radcliffe film Kill Your Darlings.

Also starring in the Armstrong film is Bridesmaids and IT Crowd actor Chris O'Dowd, who will play David Walsh, the Sunday Times journalist who unmasked the systemic use of performance enhancing drugs in cycling.

The Working Title film, set to start shooting tomorrow, is based on Walsh's book, Seven Deadly Sins: My Pursuit of Lance Armstrong. It charts the athlete's battle with cancer and his ill-gotten Tour de France triumphs.

According to Deadline, the film also follows O'Dowd's Walsh character as he works to expose blood doping cheats.

Walsh first questioned Armstrong's achievements in 1999 following the American's first Tour de France victory. However, the cyclist successfully sued the Sunday Times after it made allegations about his doping in 2004.

Earlier this year, Armstrong agreed an undisclosed settlement with the newspaper after he admitted cheating.

The biopic is being helmed by Stephen Frears, the director of Philomena and The Queen. Breaking Bad's Jesse Plemons and The Beach's Guillaume Canet have bagged supporting roles.