Author: Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: After hitting a home run during the holidays with his new take on the Dracula story Nosferatu, Robert Eggers looks to be staying in the Christmas spirit for a new project he has set his sights on. Sources tell Deadline that Warner Bros is in development with Eggers who will write and direct a retelling of the classic Charles Dickens Christmas ghost story A Christmas Carol. Insiders add that while negotiations are not underway with talent, Eggers is writing the role of Ebenezer Scrooge for his longtime collaborator Willem Dafoe. Chris Columbus and Elenor Columbus are attached to produce via Maiden…

EXCLUSIVE: Julian Fellowes is hitting the road this week and heading to New York City, the setting of his latest hit series, HBO’s The Gilded Age, premiering its third season at the Tribeca Festival on Thursday. Additionally, Fellowes will be teeing up promotions ahead of the September 12 premiere of the third and “final” installment of the Downton Abbey films, featuring the lead cast from the beloved PBS and ITV series of the same name. Fellowes will appear on the red carpet at Tribeca in his wheelchair due to issues caused by spinal stenosis, a condition that compresses the spinal…

EXCLUSIVE: Alison Oliver (Saltburn) and Anora Oscar nominee Yura Borisov have signed on to star in Dennis, a romance marking the feature debut of BAFTA-nominated actress Emily Mortimer, for A24 and Fruit Tree. Written and directed by Mortimer, the film follows a British student (Oliver) and a Russian poet (Borisov) who fall in love in 1990s Moscow. The project marks a reunion for A24 and Fruit Tree following their work on two Jesse Eisenberg projects: his forthcoming untitled comedy, starring Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti, on which we were first to report, and his feature directorial debut, When You Finish…

Pippa Scott, the veteran actress who appeared in such films like 1958’s six-time Oscar-nominated Auntie Mame and 1956’s The Searchers, has died at the age of 90. Per The Hollywood Reporter, she died May 22 of congenital heart failure at her Santa Monica home, her daughter Miranda Tollman told the publication. Born Nov. 10, 1934 to entertainment industry parents in Los Angeles — mother Laura Straub, a stage actress, and father Allan Scott, Oscar-nominated for his screenplay for 1943’s So Proudly We Hail! — Scott studied at Radcliffe and UCLA, later training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in…

Jay Roach and the Meet The Parents gang promised a topping great screenplay for the next edition, the franchise’s 4th, which recently set Ariana Grande along with original cast and announced John Hamburg is directing. “The script is really good,” said De Niro after a screening of the hit comedy where he famously flexed his comedy cops as Jack Byrnes, human lie detector and CIA dad hazing his daughter’s fiancé – played by Teri Polo and Ben Stiller. “I’m looking forward to it,” he said. The audience is too, repeatedly cracking up during a 25th anniversary screening and reunion Q&A…

As LGBTQ representation evolves onscreen, films like I Don’t Understand You understand the universal truth that it’s impossible to support gay rights without supporting gay wrongs. David Joseph Craig and Brian Crano, the husbands and writing/directing duo behind the dark comedy horror now in theaters, spoke to Deadline about the importance of writing “queer characters not just being labeled as queer” in their semi-autobiographical about a gay couple on a nightmare vacation in Italy while preparing to adopt a baby. “There are a lot of different steps in emotions in a queer person, and I think we should see more…

As Malia Obama launches her directorial career with her first short film, the former first daughter is attempting to make her own name. Michelle Obama recently shared her reaction to her and Barack‘s 25-year old daughter “trying to distinguish” herself by dropping her last name with the release of her short film The Heart at last year’s Sundance Film Festival, instead crediting herself as Malia Ann. “Our daughters [Malia and Sasha] are 25 and 23. They are young adult women, but they definitely went through a period in their teen years where it was the push away,” said Michelle during…

TriStar has a sequel to their sleeper comedy One of Them Days in the works with stars Keke Palmer and SZA expected to return. The comedy opened to $11.8 million in January and did a near 5x multiple at the domestic box office, grossing $50M. The buddy comedy follows best friends and roommates Dreux and Alyssa, who discover that the latter’s boyfriend has spent all of their rent money. The two find themselves going to extremes in a race against the clock to avoid eviction and keep their friendship intact. The pic notched 94% with critics and 90% with audiences on…

UPDATED, 2:15 PM: In less than 24 hours, the New York jury in Harvey Weinstein’s rape retrial will begin deliberations. In all likelihood, the seven-woman, five-man panel could be behind closed doors by mid-morning East Coast time to decide whether the once-swaggering producer will be sitting in a state prison cell for the rest of his days. The defense concluded its long closing argument earlier Tuesday, and now the prosecution has just a bit more to go in its final pitch to the jurors. Whether it takes less or more to reach a verdict than the five days it took the…

Ryan Coogler has no plans for a Sinners sequel, which is by design. In a resurfaced interview posted before the Michael B. Jordan-starring film was released in theaters, the filmmaker said he thought of Sinners as a “full meal.” “I’ve been in a space of making franchise films for a bit, so I wanted to get away from that,” Coogler told Ebony in an interview posted on April 15. “I was looking forward to working on a film that felt original and personal to me and had an appetite for delivering something to audiences that was original and unique.” The…