Bob Marley is to be the focus of a biopic.

British director Jenny Ash is developing a project about the reggae artist, focusing on the time he spend living in London.

Ash told Deadline.com: "There's never been a fiction film about Marley. We've never had a sense of him as a real man, as opposed to the legend.

Marley lived in the British capital in 1977, after an attempt was made on his life in Jamaica. While there he hung out with the likes of the Sex Pistols and other punk rockers.

Greenacre Films' Amanda Jenks and Nadine Marsh Edwards are going to produce the project.

However, Ash does not yet have the right to use his songs in the project, a stumbling block which has left other planned biopics of Marvin Gaye and Janis Jopling in the shade.

She also did not add who was in line to play the 'No Woman No Cry' hitmaker.