MOVIES
June Pictures and B Story announced a May filming start for the psychological thriller, Thoroughbred, which marks the directorial debut of playwright-screenwriter Cory Finley. Olivia Cooke (Ready Player One) stars with Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch) and Anton Yelchin (Green Room, Star Trek) in the story of a volatile friendship between two suburban teenage girls who discover that a murder might solve both of their problems.
The novel The Ice Beneath Her by Camilla Grebe has landed an adaptation at New Line Cinema with American Sniper's Andrew Lazar as producer. The book, often compared to previous adaptations Gone Girl and Girl On The Train, is told from the POV of an unreliable narrator and revolves around an investigator and psychological profiler who work to solve the cast of a young woman found beheaded in the home of a prominent businessman.
Paul Rudd is taking a dramatic turn as the lead in the Ben Lewin-directed The Catcher was a Spy, a film written from a script by Robert Rodat that's based on the book by Nicholas Dawidoff. Rudd will star in the true story as Moe Berg, the only Major League ballplayer whose baseball card is on display at the headquarters of the CIA since he has the singular distinction of both a 15-year career as a catcher and a spy for the OSS during World War II.
James Foxx is in talks to star in an unusual "procedural" film, the dark, R-rated puppet project Happytime Murders, which takes place in a world where humans and puppets coexist, with the puppets viewed as second-class citizens. The story plot hinges on a group of puppet cast members of the 1980s children's TV show The Happytime Gang who begin turning up dead and an alcoholic, disgraced LAPD detective-turned-private-eye puppet who takes the case with his former human partner.
Last week, I noted that Robert Downey Jr. had indicated a Sherlock Holmes 3 might be in the works, and this week Deadline reported that screenwriter James Coyne has been tapped to pen a rewrite of the project. Coyne will take over writing duties begun by Iron Man 3 scribe Drew Pearc, continuing the Guy Ritchie-directed series that stars Downey Jr. and Jude Law.
The official trailer has been released for Snowden, Oliver Stone's upcoming film adaptation of two books: The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World's Most Wanted Man by Luke Harding and Time of the Octopus, a novel by Anatoly Kucherena, Snowden's Russian Lawyer. The film, set for release on September 16, stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Snowden, with a cast rounded out by Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Timothy Olyphant, Tom Wilkinson and Zachary Quinto.
The annual Arthur Lyons Film Noir Festival returns to Palm Springs, California, during May 12-15. Highlights include the restoration of Sudden Fear (1952) and a newly restored print of The Accused (1949) from the Library of Congress.
TELEVISION
Office alum John Krasinski has been cast as the next Jack Ryan in the TV series project based on Tom Clancy’s popular CIA hero, coming to Amazon via Paramount TV. While there is no official green light yet, the move is seen as a way to help secure a series order.
The Weinstein Company is developing an adaptation of Omerta, based on the final novel by The Godfather author Mario Puzo, with Sylvester Stallone to play the lead role of mob boss Raymonde Aprile, the last great American Don. The Magnificent Seven's Antoine Fuqua is also attached to direct the pilot, which is moving forward at a rapid pace and is a likely candidate for a network pickup.
Fox has gotten an early jump on its pickups for the 2016-17 broadcast season handing out an early series order to two shows, including 24: Legacy, which now counts former 24 star Kiefer Sutherland as an executive producer. 24: Legacy is a new take on the franchise that features an all-new cast of characters and is structured in the same style of the original series.
American Psycho author Bret Easton Ellis has signed on to direct a thriller series, The Deleted, for Fullscreen’s new subscription video service. Although Ellis has written for the screen and has directed some short films, The Deleted will be his first try at directing. The project centers on the disappearance of three people in Los Angeles that seem to be unconnected to each other but trigger the collective paranoia of a group of twenty-somethings who recently escaped from a cult.
Fans of the BBC Sherlock series were thrilled to see Benedict Cumberbatch filming new scenes from the next installment, not scheduled for broadcast until next year. Fans captured some of the action in London for the first episode, which the Evening Standard reported would be based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 1892 Sherlock story "The Adventure of Silver Blaze."
The Guardian looked deeper into the new British drama The Secret, based on the startling story of a devoutly murderous Northern Ireland dentist, and speculated on why Ulster has become the crime TV hotspot.
Acorn Media has released a new trailer for its upcoming DVD release of the first season of the Australian crime drama Janet King, featuring senior crown prosecutor Janet King (Marta Dusseldorp). (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO
The latest Crime and Science Radio focused on "Things That Go Boom in the Night," an interview with weapons and explosives expert and Author John Gilstrap.
Suspense Radio's Inside Edition welcomed authors Carl Brookins and Claire Mackintosh.
Beyond the Cover spoke with NY Times Bestselling author Steve Berry and literary agent Meg Ruley, whose clients include Lisa Gardner and Tess Gerritsen.
GAMES
The PlayStation 4 released the noir episodic adventure game, Blues and Bullets,for digital download. The game is set in the 1920's in the fictional US city of Santa Esperanza and stars Eliot Ness, a former legendary cop who, after putting Al Capone behind bars, wants to spend the rest of his life in peace, working behind the counter of a diner. But when a group of kids go missing, he's drawn back into the world of police work, allowing game players to "dive into shootouts, search for clues and rough up a few cronies in order to get to the bottom of the mystery.
The Guardian profiled Sam Barlow's Her Story and the story behind the new police procedural thriller game.
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