Quote from Oladosun Joshua Segun on August 23, 2026, 12:48 PM

Benjamin Gates is returning, so get your treasure-discovering supplies ready. The director of the Disney adventure series starring Nicolas Cage said that a third movie is "finally" in development, more than 20 years after National Treasure was first published.

https://youtu.be/vqUPxNT8io4?si=Q0ejZaUDyxIVdBLk

“I was thinking about mentioning this tonight, I’ll say it tonight,” on August 21, during a live broadcast of the National Treasure Hunt podcast, director Jon Turteltaub informed the audience. “It’s happening. You’re the first people I have said this out loud to.”

"It's finally real," he declared.

The joyful news was confirmed by Turteltaub, who directed both the 2004 film and its 2007 sequel, National Treasure: Book of Secrets. However, he noted that projects in the business are subject to sudden changes in status.

“Now, it’s ‘Hollywood real,’ meaning things can happen,” he clarified. “Nic gets hit by a bus; there’s no National Treasure. If I get hit by a bus, there’s probably a National Treasure. Welcome to Hollywood, that’s Hollywood.”

Turteltaub claims that a script for the third movie has been written and authorized by both Disney and himself. The studio informed him it "sounds like a movie we can make."

Who else is on board, then? The National Treasure 3 script has received the "blessing" of film producer Jerry Bruckheimer, according to the treasure podcast's Instagram post.

In the original National Treasure, historian Ben Gates and his pals Riley Poole (Justin Bartha) and Dr. Abigail Chase (Diane Kruger) set out to steal the Declaration of Independence in order to locate a map to a hidden Freemason treasure. The three made a comeback for the follow-up, along with original actors Jon Voight and Harvey Keitel.

https://youtu.be/UYGlW6ZD-Mc?si=mqusq5-fNBZqgKEo&t=3

However, it appears that a possible third book of secrets has already been in the works for about twenty years.

The short-lived 2022 Disney+ series National Treasure: Edge of History gave fans a brief return to the franchise's setting, but it only increased anticipation for a third movie. After all, a cliffhanger at the conclusion of the second film, in which the President of the United States (Bruce Greenwood) informs Ben about a secret page 47 in the title Book of Secrets, was alluded to in the program, which included appearances from Bartha and Keitel.

Bruckheimer, who produced both movies and the spinoff series, provided a good report on National Treasure 3's progress at the time.

"We said we'd like to make another National Treasure and they said, ‘Sure, let's come up with a new cast,'" in a 2022 interview, he informed media reporters. "At the same time, we were developing National Treasure for the theaters with Nicolas Cage—which we still are. So, that's ongoing."