Welcome to Monday and the latest crime drama news from screens big and small and on the air:
MOVIES
Idris Elba (Luther, Beasts of No Nation) is set to direct his first film later this year, an adaptation of Victor Headley’s novel Yardie. The story centers on D, a courier carrying cocaine from Jamaica to London, who decides to go it alone and disappears into the mean streets of Hackney carrying a kilo of white powder his erstwhile friends are anxious to recover.
Steven Soderbergh will produce and likely direct a feature film about the Panama Papers, the biggest leak of data in corporate and government history. Scott Z. Burns has been taped to write the script, based on the upcoming book Secrecy World by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jake Bernstein.
Millennium Films' submarine action-thriller Hunter Killer has added two additional members to its crew, drafting Zane Holtz and Gabriel Chavarria for plum roles. In the film (which follows an untested sub captain teamed with an elite military unit to rescue the Russian president from a military coup), Holtz will play a skilled member of the unit, while Chavarria will play a Navy SEAL aboard the American sub. The film also stars Gerard Butler, Gary Oldman, Billy Bob Thornton, Common, and Taylor John Smith.
NOIR CITY returns to Seattle July 22-28 to a new home at the SIFF Cinema Egyptian. Sponsored by the Film Noir Foundation, this year's slate includes an 18 film lineup subtitled "Film Noir: A to B" and comprises nine double bills that present a chronological excursion through the classic noir era, with themed pairs of "A" and "B" titles playing together.
A trailer was released for the dark thriller I Am Not a Serial Killer, an adaptation of the novel by Dan Wells with a premise that basically "starts as Dexter for young adults before spinning into much stranger territory."
The first trailer was released for Blood Father, director Jean-François Richet’s action thriller starring Mel Gibson is a hardened ex-con protecting his daughter (Erin Moriarty) from bad guys.
TELEVISION
ITV is headed to Scotland for a new six-part serial killer drama Loch Ness, written by Fortitude’s Stephen Brady and exec produced by Tim Haines (Beowulf). The show centers on "a community nourished and sustained by myth and bordered by untamed nature" where a serial killer becomes a matter of life and death for local detective Annie Cathro (Laura Fraser) who is trying to cope with her first murder case.
HBO Europe will switch to a focus on original dramas following success of adaptations. The subscriber satellite service launched its latest freshly penned drama, the Czech series Pustina (Wasteland), the second original drama to be offered to HBO Europe subscribers after the Polish thriller Wataha (The Pack). In the longer term, the hope is that HBO Europe produce original drama that captures the attention of the world in the way that Scandinavian crime thrillers have over the past few years.
Blue Bloods star Tom Selleck signed a deal in the nick of time to return for Season 7 of the CBS cop drama, which began production last week. The veteran actor plays Police Commissioner Frank Reagan on the show about a multigenerational family of cops dedicated to New York City law enforcement that also stars Donnie Wahlberg, Bridget Moynihan, Will Estes, Amy Carlson, Marissa Ramirez, Tony Terraciano, Andrew Terraciano and Sami Gayle.
Richard Cabral has joined Felicity Huffman and Regina King as the third cast member to sign on for the upcoming third installment of John Ridley’s praised ABC anthology series, American Crime. In Season 3, the show will be set in North Carolina and will deal with labor issues, economic divides and individual rights.
Adrian Martinez has booked a series regular role on NBC’s The Blacklist spinoff The Blacklist: Redemption. The follow-on show stars Tom Keen (Ryan Eggold) who joins forces with Susan "Scottie" Hargrave (Famke Janssen), the brilliant and cunning chief of Grey Matters, a covert mercenary organization that solves problems governments don't dare touch. Martinez will play Dumont, a computer hacker with an exotic air who keeps his boss apprised of their enemies' movements.
Production has begun in Toronto on Ransom, the 13-episode drama created by David Vainola (Combat Hospital) and Frank Spotnitz (The X-Files). New cast members joining Luke Roberts, who stars as hostage negotiator Eric Beaumont, include Sarah Greene (Penny Dreadful) who plays a young newcomer eager to prove herself; Brandon Jay McLaren (The Killing, Chicago Fire) as a psychological profiler; and Nazneen Contractor (Heroes Reborn) as an ex-cop.
Blair Underwood has closed a deal to play a new series regular on Season 2 of ABC drama series Quantico. He'll play Owen Hall, a charming, intelligent and inspirational CIA officer every fledgling operative wishes he or she could learn from. But is he running them, or using them for something else?
Sleepy Hollow is losing more of its cast: Daniel Reynolds and Sophie Foster will not be back for Season 4 much, if at all, joining actors Lance Gross and Jessica Camacho who aren't returning as series regulars. Sleepy Hollow will premiere its 13-episode fourth season at some point in early 2017, with production scheduled to begin in August of this year.
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO
Crime Fiction Lover recently joined Brum Radio to talk about domestic noir, on a show that also featured an interview with British crime author Mark Billingham.
The John Batchelor Show took a look at Paul Collins' biography of Edgar Allan Poe in his younger years and how this mysteriously conflicted figure emerges as a genius both driven and undone by his artistic ambitions.
Judy Clemens, author of the Anthony and Agatha-nominated Stella Crown mysteries, the Grim Reaper series, and the stand-alone, Lost Son, joined host Libby Hellman on Author on the Air.
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