Legendary Is Making a Major Move To Align Its Monster Properties
The studio is moving its in-development King Kong picture, Kong: Skull Island, from Universal to Warner Bros. — the studio that is home to the new Godzilla franchise — in order to get all their monstrous ducks in a row for a shared monster universe leading to a new King Kong vs Godzilla battle movie. Legendary and Warner parted ways last year when the former partnered up with Universal, but this reversal appears to be a one-time thing to line up franchise issues. (COL)
New Line’s ‘The Babysitter’ Nails Down a Helmer, and It’s McG
Producer-director’s Wonderland Sound & Vision has long been attached to the horror-comedy, written by Brian Duffield. Now, the Terminator Salvation director has come aboard the project and will direct it himself. Story follows a lonely twelve year old boy in love with his babysitter who discovers some hard truths about life, love, and murder. (CS)
Good News For ‘Top Of the Lake’ Fans: an Oscar Winner Is Joining Season Two
Nicole Kidman, who worked with series creator Jane Campion in the 1996 Henry james adaptation Portrait of a Lady, is coming on board the series, alongside its star, Elisabeth Moss. Story will follow Moss’ Detective Robin Griffin investigating a case both in her adopted home of Sydney and in Hong Kong, with no word yet on Kidman’s role. Shooting starts in December for a premiere in the second half of 2016. (TP)
Jennifer Lawrence Looking To Reunite With Francis Lawrence For a Big Spy Thriller
The Hunger Games star and the man who directed the final three installments are both looking at 20th Century Fox’s Red Sparrow, based on the novel by Jason Matthews. Story centers on a Russian spy and a CIA agent assigned to compromise the other, but soon find themselves in a charged duel of wills, skills, and forbidden romance. Jennifer Lawrence is looking at the role of the Russian spy, while Francis Lawrence will direct the project. (TB)
‘The Good Wife’ Duo’s New CBS Show Lands Itself a Lead
Mary Elizabeth Winstead has joined the upcoming comic-thriller from Good Wife creators Robert and Michelle King. Billed as a cross between The Strain and The West Wing, show stars Winstead as Laurel, the daughter of a Democratic political dynasty who is pulled back into the family business when her brother needs political help. She soon learns that alien spawn have come to Earth and eaten the brains of a number of congressmen and Hill staffers. (TVL)
HBO’s Bernie Madoff Movie Fills Out Its Cast, Adds Five More Actors
Nathan Darrow, Kathrine Narducci, Steve Coulter, Kristen Connolly and Diana Henriques have been cast opposite Robert De Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer in The Wizard of Lies, HBO Films’ movie about the disgraced financier. Barry Levinson is directing the film, which is described as a look behind the scenes at Madoff’s massive Ponzi scheme, how it was perpetrated on the public and the trail of destruction it left in its wake, both for the victims and Madoff’s family. (DH)
Director Jon Amiel’s World War I Film ‘The Angel Makers’ Snags Christina Hendricks To Star
Two-time Oscar nominee Emily Watson is also part of the cast, along with Abbie Cornish, Max Riemelt and David Kross. The film, based on true events, centers on the women of England’s Yorkshire Moors, who were left to maintain the farms when their men headed off to fight in France in 1917. When the women enlist German POWs from a nearby internment camp to do labor on their land, affairs soon begin to bloom. (THR)
A Whole Passel of Actors Have Signed Up To Showcase ‘Their Finest Hour and a Half’
Gemma Arterton, Bill Nighy, Richard E. Grant, Helen McRory, Eddie Marsan, Rachel Stirling, Henry Goodman, Jack Huston and Jake Lacey are all signed up for the WWII comedy. Based on the novel by Lissa Evans, the film tells the comical story of a disparate group of people brought together in Norfolk to make a British propaganda film. (EMP)
ABC Gives Pilot Production Order to Legendary TV Comedy ‘Downward Dog’
The single-camera half-hour project revolves around a woman and her dog. The concept originated as a web series created by Samm Hodges and Michael Killen for Animal Media Group. Hodges and Killen will exec produce the series for Legendary and ABC Studios, along with Mosaic Media Group’s Jimmy Miller and Sam Hansen and Animal Media’s Kathy Dziubek. (VAR)
Screenwriters: ‘The Great Gatsby’
The 132-page screenplay by Baz Luhrmann and Craig Pierce, based on the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. (GITS)