After years in development, Warner Bros. Pictures is moving forward with a new incarnation of Little Shop of Horrors, with Greg Berlanti set to direct and Matthew Robinson writing the script, Deadline is reporting.
This one will be a musical, a fresh version of the 30-year old Frank Oz-directed film that starred Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Vincent Gardenia, and Steven Martin. That remake was based on the Roger Corman-directed 1960 low budget sci-fi campy tale about a clumsy young man who raises a plant, discovers it is carnivorous, and kills to keep it fed.
The 1986 Little Shop of Horrors is an all-time great, but let’s not forget that it too was a remake proving that not all remakes are bad. With modern effects it will be interesting to see a fresh take, although nothing will ever ever top the puppetry in Oz’s masterpiece.
This reboot has been in the works for quite some time, in fact, as back in 2012 Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Inception, The Dark Knight Rises) was in talks to play Seymour, the nerdy florist who is forced to feed the beast in order to keep his fame and popularity rising.
Marc Platt (Drive) is still producing.
Berlanti last directed the 2010 comedy Life As We Know It. More recently, he and his Warner Bros-based Berlanti Productions have been busy spearheading six TV series, with Supergirl, Blindspot, The Flash, Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow, and the upcoming Riverdale.