Movies
Bruce Campbell Says More ‘Evil Dead’ Films May Happen
According to Deadline, at the TCA conference, Bruce Campbell joked about the potential for new Evil Dead films, stating, “‘Ash vs Evil Dead‘ will force us to make more movies. That’s only 10 hours of programming, we need 8 more movies. Making a fourth movie would work. No matter what we give them it will never be enough.”
While he may be joking, director and executive creator Sam Raimi was deadly serious when he said that he’d be behind the camera if Campbell would be in front of it.
Campbell also teased that the series could have a very long life, depending on the reaction from the audience. “Now seasons two through five will be much easier because we all know each other,” he quipped, talking about co-star Lucy Lawless and executive producer Craig DiGregrorio.
While this isn’t exactly new news – there have been talks of a new film continuing Mia’s story since the success of the 2013 remake/reboot – it’s pretty amazing to see how the interest in “Ash vs Evil Dead” is so powerful and so enthusiastic that the imaginations of Campbell and Raimi are running wild and rampant, seemingly full of ideas on how to expand this universe into something truly huge and incredible.
[Related Post] Interview with Sam Raimi, Robert Tapert and Bruce Campbell On “Ash vs Evil Dead”!
The cast is led by Bruce Campbell (Evil Dead, “Burn Notice”) in the role of Ash Williams, Lucy Lawless (“Salem,” “Spartacus”) as Ruby a mysterious figure who believes Ash is the cause of the Evil outbreaks, Ray Santiago (“Touch,” Meet the Fockers) as Pablo Simon Bolivar, an idealistic immigrant who becomes Ash’s loyal sidekick, Dana DeLorenzo (A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas) as Kelly Maxwell, a moody wild child trying to outrun her past and Jill Marie Jones (“Sleepy Hollow”) as Amanda Fisher, a disgraced Michigan State Trooper set to find our anti-hero Ash and prove his responsibility in the grisly murder of her partner.
Mimi Rogers was recently cast Suzy Maxwell, a woman who is reunited with her family and several uninvited guests after a freak accident. Suzy is the mother of Kelly (series regular Dana DeLorenzo), a moody wild child trying to outrun her past.
Raimi is directing the first episode of “Ash vs Evil Dead” (see the other directors here) that he wrote with Ivan Raimi (Darkman, Army of Darkness, Drag Me to Hell), Craig DiGregorio (“Workaholics,” “Chuck”) and Tom Spezialy (“Chuck,” “Reaper,” “Desperate Housewives”). Raimi will also serve as executive producer, with Rob Tapert (Evil Dead, “Spartacus,” “Xena: Warrior Princess”) and Bruce Campbell (Evil Dead, “Burn Notice”) along with Craig DiGregorio (“Workaholics,” “Chuck”) who will serve as executive producer/showrunner. Ivan Raimi will co-executive produce and Aaron Lam (“Spartacus”) and Chloe Smith (“Spartacus”) will serve as producers.
You can read our lengthy interview with Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert, Bruce Campbell by clicking here!
Movies
Warner Bros. Reportedly Developing International ‘Nightmare on Elm Street’ Movie With Lee Cronin?!
Last November, Robert Englund had shared his thoughts on why there hasn’t been any movement on the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise in the past sixteen years. Englund told Indiewire at the time, “There are so many people involved who have a piece of the action.”
“When Wes passed away, he left an awful lot of rights to his estate,” Englund explained. “He has many many rights that he worked out between character titles and names and plot and things like that. New Line Cinema obviously has a big hand in it. And much of that was surrendered to Ted Turner, then went to Warner Bros. So Warner Bros. has a huge piece of it.”
We bring this up because Englund was spot on. And things have only gotten more interesting since he made those comments last year. We had recently learned that Paramount has joined forces with the Craven Estate to make a new Nightmare on Elm Street movie based on Wes Craven’s original screenplay for the original movie, but here’s where things get real interesting.
While the Craven Estate has the domestic rights to Craven’s original Elm Street screenplay, Warner Bros./New Line actually retains the international rights to A Nightmare on Elm Street. And Puck News reports this week that Warner Bros. is actively developing their own Nightmare on Elm Street movie to compete with the announced Paramount project!
Of course, what’s particularly interesting about this whole mess is that Paramount is actively attempting to buy Warner Bros., a sale which has been delayed until at least next year.
Puck reports, “Sources with knowledge of the matter think Paramount figured that by the time their movie got underway, the WarnerMount deal would have closed and Warners would be compelled to release the Paramount version overseas. But Warners’ Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy didn’t care for that plan. Now they’re looking to make their own movie, which they can only distribute overseas, and are in talks with Lee Cronin to produce, write, and direct.”
So what we have is a situation where Paramount is attempting to make one Nightmare on Elm Street movie for the domestic market while Warner Bros. is attempting to make an entirely different Elm Street film project for the international market. The obvious solution here is for both entities to work with one another and bring all the rights together to make one proper Elm Street movie that can play in both markets, which could very well end up being the case if the Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery merger does end up taking place late next year.
In the meantime, it seems that WB and Paramount are in a race to beat one another to the punch. While the Paramount project has been officially announced, we must note that the Warner Bros./Lee Cronin project has not. We only have the Puck News report to go on, but for what it’s worth, that report lines up with what Bloody Disgusting has been hearing lately.
Unfortunately, Nightmare on Elm Street isn’t the only franchise that is mired in complicated rights issues. All of this sounds eerily similar to the situation with Friday the 13th, which has its rights split up between several different entities. The only thing coming soon on that front is “Crystal Lake,” a prequel television series from A24 and Peacock that managed to bring all the rights holders together. Even still, don’t expect a series about Jason Voorhees rampaging through the woods. The series centers instead on Jason’s mother, Pamela Voorhees.
Making a proper new Friday the 13th movie, well, that’s proving to be as difficult as it is to make a proper new Nightmare on Elm Street movie. At a time it was said that nothing could kill either Jason or Freddy, but complicated legal issues are damn sure trying their best.
Stay tuned for more on all things Nightmare on Elm Street as this all develops.
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