‘National Treasure 3’ Is Finally Happening With Nicolas Cage Expected to Return

Jon Turteltaub says he has a script Disney likes. Disney itself hasn’t said a word.

National Treasure 3 is happening, and the person who said so is the man who directed the first two. Jon Turteltaub told a room of fans in Philadelphia on Friday, August 21 that a third film is real, that he finally has a script he likes, and that Disney has signed off on it.

“I was thinking about mentioning this tonight, I’ll say it tonight,” Turteltaub said during a live recording of the National Treasure Hunt podcast at the Philadelphia Visitor Center. “It’s happening. You’re the first people I have said this out loud to.”

Then he built a fence around it in the same breath. “It’s finally real. Now, it’s ‘Hollywood real,’ meaning things can happen. Nic gets hit by a bus, there’s no National Treasure. If I get hit by a bus, there’s probably a National Treasure.”

What’s confirmed, and what isn’t

The film’s existence is about as solid as a pre-announcement gets, because the source is the director talking on the record about his own project. He said they “finally have a script that I like,” and that Disney’s response was that it “sounds like a movie we can make.”

Nicolas Cage coming back is a different claim, and a softer one. Turteltaub said that “to whatever extent we can, everyone’s back” — intent, not a signed deal. TheWrap reports Cage is in talks. Disney declined to comment.

Read the bus line again and it’s clear enough: the director is describing a movie that does not exist without a star who has not been announced.

No release date. No studio announcement. No other returning cast named. What exists is a director, a script Disney likes, and a franchise that has been sitting for nearly two decades.

Where the franchise actually left off

Turteltaub directed National Treasure in 2004 — Cage as historian Ben Gates, stealing the Declaration of Independence to keep Sean Bean’s Ian from getting to it first — and National Treasure: Book of Secrets in 2007. The two films cleared more than $800 million worldwide, per Deadline.

The franchise did get a third chapter. It just wasn’t this one. Disney+ launched National Treasure: Edge of History in 2022 with Catherine Zeta-Jones, and canceled it after a single season.

The venue wasn’t an accident either. Turteltaub said it in Philadelphia, during the city’s first National Treasure Weekend, blocks from where the Declaration of Independence was signed.

The facts

• Confirmed by the director — a third National Treasure film is in development, with a script Disney has approved.
• Not confirmed — Nicolas Cage’s return. TheWrap reports he is in talks; Turteltaub says “everyone’s back” to whatever extent possible.
• Disney — declined to comment. No studio announcement, no release date, no other cast named.
• Where he said it — a live recording of the National Treasure Hunt podcast in Philadelphia, Friday, August 21, 2026.