It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:
THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES
Gerard Butler is set to star in the action thriller, Remote Control. He'll play Michael Rafter, a former war correspondent turned corporate security consultant, whose life is overturned when he receives a mysterious phone call from an unknown source. Intrigued by the caller’s intent, Rafter investigates and soon uncovers the threads of a global conspiracy, finding himself drawn into a fight for his life and pursued by the 212, a powerful shadow organization.
Fellow action-hero actor Liam Neeson is also in a new film, Honest Thief, which recently had UK and Irish rights snapped up by Signature Entertainment. Neeson stars as a bank robber who tries to turn himself in after falling for a woman (Kate Walsh) who works at the storage facility where he’s stashed his money. Complications ensue when his case is turned over to a corrupt FBI agent (Jai Courtney) and he must go underground to save both himself and the woman he loves.
The busy Neeson is also set to star in Memory, an action-thriller from Casino Royale director Martin Campbell. The project is based on the 2003 Dutch film, The Memory Of A Killer, with Dario Scardapane (The Bridge) writing the screenplay for the English-language version. Neeson will play an expert assassin with a reputation for discreet precision who refuses to complete a job for a dangerous criminal organization and must go on the hunt for those who want him dead.
Not to be outdone, Bruce Willis is taking on his own action-thriller project, joining Jesse Metcalf in Open Source. The story follows a billionaire tech CEO (Willis) who hires a team of fearless mercenaries to protect a piece of technology that, if exposed, could destroy the world. Their mission becomes even higher risk when the CEO’s daughter is kidnapped by an extremely dangerous terrorist group who will stop at nothing to obtain the tech.
Westworld actress Thandie Newton will headline Julian Higgins’s feature directorial debut, God’s Country, based on James Lee Burke’s short story "Winter Light." The neo-Western thriller is set in the bleak winter landscape of the Mountain West where Newton plays a college professor living on her own at the edge of a national forest. One day she confronts two hunters trespassing on her land, triggering a battle of wills with dangerous ramifications.
Joel Edgerton and Sean Harris are set to star in the Australian crime drama, The Unknown Man, based on a real-life Australian sting operation. Two men who meet on a plane strike up a conversation that turns into friendship. For Henry Teague (Harris), worn down by a lifetime of physical labor and crime, this is a dream come true, and his new friend Mark (Edgerton) becomes his savior and ally. What Henry doesn’t know is that Mark is a seasoned undercover officer – working to convict Henry for an unsolved murder committed years prior.
Shooting is set to begin in Canada on the thriller Cold Providence. Star Trek's Karl Urban will play a novelist with writer’s block and a mysterious bag of cash who finds himself on the run with a woman (Rampage star Malin Akerman) who has some troubling secrets of her own. Co-directors Bill Jones and Ben Timlett describe the project as having "the propulsive momentum of a road movie, the bleak violence and sexual trappings of a neo-noir and the dark humor of the best black comedies."
TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES
In a competitive situation involving multiple bidders, Hulu has landed The Holdout, a legal thriller from Oscar-winning writer Graham Moore (The Imitation Game) based on his latest novel. The story centers on Maya Seale who served on a jury in the decade’s most sensational murder trial ten years ago. Now an attorney, she reunites with the other jurors for a true crime docuseries about the crime…and when one of her fellow jurors is murdered, Maya must prove her own innocence by getting to the bottom of a case that’s far from closed.
Julia Roberts is reuniting with Mr Robot creator Sam Esmail on another podcast adaptation, starring alongside Sean Penn, Armie Hammer, and Joel Edgerton. The remake of Slate’s Watergate scandal audio series, Slow Burn, has Roberts playing Martha Mitchell, wife of Richard Nixon’s Attorney General John Mitchell.
Legendary Global has acquired the rights to Robert Whiting’s book Tokyo Underworld: The Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan, with Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Terence Winter set to write and executive produce the adaptation. It tells the true story of Nick Zapetti, a streetwise 25-year-old Italian-American GI who relocated to war-ravaged Japan in the aftermath of World War II to become the undisputed king of the underground black market in Tokyo.
Tate Donovan is set as the male lead and Oscar winner Melissa Leo as the female lead in Fox’s drama pilot Blood Relative, a forensic genealogy-themed crime drama. Based on James Renner’s 2018 article "Beyond the Jungle of Bad: The True Story of Two Women from California Who Are Solving All the Mysteries," it follows Dr. Colleen Fitzpatrick and Dr. Margaret Press, who have combined their genealogy expertise to push the boundaries of forensic science and help law enforcement identify Joe and Jane Does and track down serial killers.
Golden Globe, Tony and Olivier Award winner Janet McTeer (Ozark) has been cast as a lead opposite David Oyelowo in The President Is Missing. The Showtime drama pilot is based on the novel by President Bill Clinton and James Patterson and is being shepherded by producers Christopher McQuarrie and Anthony Peckham. McTeer will play Carolyn Brock, President Stroud’s Chief of Staff.
Angus Sampson is set as a series regular opposite Kiele Sanchez in the CBS drama, The Lincoln Lawyer, based on Michael Connelly’s series of bestselling novels. Sampson will play Cisco, a former biker gang member who now serves as the title character's investigator, friend, and when necessary, bodyguard.
The X-Files alum Mitch Pileggi is set as a series regular in Walker, a reimagining of CBS’s long-running 1990s action/crime series Walker, Texas Ranger. Keegan Allen also was also recently added to the cast, joining titular star Jared Padalecki and previously announced Lindsey Morgan. The project centers on Cordell Walker (Padalecki), a widower and father of two with his own moral code, who returns home to Austin after being undercover for two years and finds unexpected common ground with his new partner, played by Morgan, (one of the first women in Texas Rangers’ history), while growing increasingly suspicious about the circumstances surrounding his wife’s death.
Bebe Neuwirth is set as a recurring cast member in HBO Max’s thriller drama series, The Flight Attendant, starring and executive produced by Kaley Cuoco. The Flight Attendant is a story of how an entire life can change in one night. Cassie, a flight attendant (Cuoco), wakes up in the wrong hotel, in the wrong bed, with a dead man – and no idea of what happened. Neuwirth will play Diana Carlisle, a senior partner at the law firm where Cassie's best friend, Annie (Zosia Mamet) works.
Vicky McClure has been hired to star in a bomb-squad drama for ITV. Trigger Point is a six-part thriller that follows counter terrorism policing and the terrifying work of the Metropolitan Police Bomb Disposal Squad in London.
Jill Halfpenny, Jonas Armstrong, and Rupert Penry-Jones are to star in an identity thriller for British broadcaster Channel 5. The Drowning starts when Jodie (Halfpenny) catches sight of a teenage boy, Daniel, and is convinced she's found her missing son. Whether she is right or not, in that moment her spark of hope is ignited and she commits to a dangerous and transgressive path that will take her to the edge of reason.
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO
NPR's Ari Shapiro spoke with Kate Winkler Dawson, author of American Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, and the Birth of American CSI, a book about Edward Oscar Heinrich, an early, great forensic scientist.
The latest guest on Speaking of Mysteries was Heather Chavez, talking about her debut, No Bad Deed.
Suspense Radio's Beyond the Cover welcomed Bryan Gruley to talk about his latest book, Purgatory Bay (Bleak Harbor book 2).
Criminal Mischief, with Dr. DP Lyle, featured the second part in a series on Toxicology.
Wrong Place, Write Crime host Frank Zafiro chatted with "Big Daddy Thug" Todd Robinson about Boo and Junior, Thuglit, France, and the publishing industry.
The Writer's Detective Bureau host, veteran Police Detective Adam Richardson, took on the topics of things that police work teaches cops about daily life, prosecuting a serial killer when not all of the victims have been found, and how someone on federal supervised release would be wanted by the US Marshals.
It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club spoke with Oklahoma author Donis Casey about her debut novel, The Old Buzzard Had It Coming.
THEATRE
Sydney, Australia's Genesian Theatre is presenting Sherlock Holmes and the Death on Thor Bridge from February 29 through April 2. The story follows a bored and weary Holmes who takes on the case of Grace Dunbar, an intelligent and independently minded governess, who is chief suspect for the murder of her employer's volatile and passionate Brazilian wife.
The John Golden Theater in New York is staging Hangmen beginning February 28, following two sold-out engagements in London and the Atlantic Theater Company. Olivier and Academy Award-winner Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) is back with his seventh brilliant and wickedly funny new play set in 1965 England. What is Britain’s (second most) famous executioner to do now that hanging has been abolished? The simple answer is a lot more than he bargained for.
The Portland Center Stage at the Armory is tackling The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which opens February 29. Fifteen-year-old Christopher has an extraordinary brain; he is exceptionally intelligent but ill-equipped to interpret everyday life. When he falls under suspicion for killing his neighbor’s dog, he sets out to identify the true culprit, which leads to an earth-shattering discovery and a journey that will change his life forever.
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