Movies
Who Will Play Pennywise in Stephen King’s ‘It’?
This past weekend Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema announced that the long-gestured adaptation of Stephen King’s It will now hit theaters on September 8, 2017, with a shoot scheduled for this summer.
The immediate question everyone was asking is what this means for Will Poulter, who had been cast as Pennywise when Cary Fukunaga was attached to direct.
Variety is reporting that Poulter has since dropped out, due to scheduling conflicts, while our own sources tell us that he’s still in contention as Mama director Andy Muschietti will hold his own auditions.
Poulter (The Maze Runner, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader) was still in the mix for the role of Pennywise, the demonic clown, late last year:
“Will Poulter would be a great option. For me he is at the top of my list,” Muschietti firmed up.
“King described 50s’ terror iconography,” he added. “And I feel there’s a whole world now to rediscover, to update. There won’t be mummies, werewolves. Terrors are going to be a lot more surprising.”
In 1960, seven outcast kids known as “The Loser Club” fight an evil demon who poses as a child-killing clown. 30 years later, they are called back to fight the same clown again.
Fukunaga’s vision for It was to create two separate films, one which tackled the protagonists as children and the second film to focus on them as adults.
Hollywood is serious about landing the next Backrooms. Hot on the heels of a Siren Head feature announcement, Deadline reports that a new movie based on viral YouTube series The Mandela Catalogue is in development.
It also has some Hollywood heavy hitters behind it.
Amblin Entertainment’s Steven Spielberg, United Artists’ Scott Stuber (Frankenstein), and Amazon MGM Studios are set to produce, emerging victorious after a highly competitive 11-studio bidding war.
Launched in 2021, the YouTube series is set in the fictional Mandela County, Wisconsin which is “invaded by shape-shifting, nearly immortal creatures called Alternates. The Alternates are led by a false depiction of the Archangel Gabriel and their aim is to wipe out the human race by psychologically torturing them to the point of suicide. The Alternates are known for manipulating AV media, TVs, computers and GPS systems.”
The movie will be directed by the series’ creator, Alex Kister, based on a screenplay he adapted with Tyler Clifton.
The Mandela Catalogue has racked up an impressive 100 million views across its official episodes alone, solidifying it as one of the largest original analog horror franchises on YouTube.
Spielberg and Holly Bario are producing for Amblin Entertainment alongside Aaron B. Koontz for Paper Street Pictures and Stuber and Nick Nesbitt for United Artists. Kister and Clifton are also producing. Annie McCreery will oversee the project for United Artists. Maria Fortese will oversee for Amblin.
Get acquainted with The Mangela Catalogue below while we wait to learn more.