Mark Harmon Bought Rights to ‘Honor Thy Father’; Will He Leave ‘NCIS’ to Star in the Movie?

Mark Harmon opted to buy the rights for the production of “Honor Thy Father,” a story that tells about the life of Lance Butterfield, a great football player who shot his abusive father on December 1995 in their home in Fort Worth, Texas. This story was originally featured on Texas Monthly’s June 1998 issue and the “NCIS” actor along with Eric Tannenbaum and his company want to produce a movie based on Butterfield’s life.

According to Deadline, the movie adaptation is now possible as Mark Harmon and his Wings Production successfully secured the rights for the “Honor Thy Father” magazine article. It was said that Angelo Pizzo, the writer, and producer of sports-based classic movies titled “Hoosiers” (1986) and “Rudy” (1993), has signed up to the team to convert the 7,500-word print article to screenplay.

It was added that Karen Sanfilippo will serve as associate producer for the project while Mark Harmon, Tannenbaum and Pizzo will be executive producers. To get an idea of what “Honor Thy Father” is about, here is the synopsis that was published on

The Texas Monthly: “It tells the story of a promising young man, Lance Butterfield, and the volatile relationship with his overbearing father, Bill who was a former Texas high school football star, renowned for his speed and power.”

Additionally, “Lance is determined to follow in his father’s footsteps but in Lance’s senior year – his championship season – something went very wrong.”

Now, it was said that Mark Harmon could star in this movie since he is a football player himself when he is younger. However, if he will do the film, it means that he will have to give up his stint on “NCIS.” In this case, will he leave the show?

It has been repeatedly reported that Mark Harmon is not leaving “NCIS” even if he has other projects to do. Instead, he will work out on a schedule that will work for his shooting days on the long-running police procedural drama and his upcoming work projects.