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
Alec Baldwin has signed on to produce and star in the crime-western feature film, Rust. The project is based on a story by Baldwin and Crown Vic helmer Joel Souza, who will write the screenplay and direct. The plot follows infamous western outlaw Harland Rust (Baldwin), who has had a bounty on his head for as long as he can remember. When his estranged 13-year-old grandson Lucas is convicted of an accidental murder and sentenced to hang, Rust travels to Kansas to break him out of prison. Together, the two fugitives must outrun legendary U.S. Marshal, Wood Helm, and bounty-hunter, Fenton "Preacher" Lang, who are hot on their trail.
Director Daniel Espinosa has boarded the drama, The Execution. The film follows the events leading up to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi Arabian-born dissident and Washington Post columnist who was killed and dismembered by a Saudi hit team after entering the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to get a marriage license.
Director Babak Najafi has been hired to direct Anna, an inspirational true political thriller about journalist Anna Politkovskaya’s brave crusade fighting for an independent voice in Putin’s Russia. In 2006, Politkovskaya was murdered in the elevator of her block of flats, an assassination that attracted international attention.
Ridley Scott will executive produce a thriller called Panopticon, with Andrés Baiz (Narcos) directing from a script by Emily Jerome. The movie will follow rising female hedge fund manager, "Chase," who decides to invest in an Arizona based private prison system that racks up huge profits. But on a tour of the prison, Chase realizes that the inmates are running the show, and she starts a dangerous game as she tries to fix things in order to save the jackpot she’s reaping for herself and her firm.
TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES
Amazon has put in development Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, a series revolving around the Lisbeth Salander character based on the books by Stieg Larsson. The project will be a co-production between Amazon Studios and Left Bank Pictures, in association with Sony Pictures TV. Based on the Larsson books, Girl with the Dragon Tattoo will take the iconic and much-loved character Lisbeth Salander and place her in today’s world with a new setting, new characters, and a new story "that will resonate with fans of the original and thrill a whole new generation."
BBC picked up the Danish crime series, DNA from The Killing co-creator, Torleif Hoppe. In the eight-part series, Rolf Larsen (played by Anders W. Berthelsen), a respected detective on the Copenhagen police force, has his life brutally upended when his baby daughter goes missing. Five years after the tragedy, a new lead emerges when a serious flaw is discovered in the Danish police’s DNA database. Realizing that his daughter may still be alive, Rolf tries to find out what really happened to her by investigating a parallel case with ties to an international child-trafficking ring. Rolf gets a helping hand from Claire (Charlotte Rampling), a seasoned French investigator working on a similar case.
A sixth season of Lucifer is moving closer to reality on Netflix after star Tom Ellis closed a deal to return as the title character. Netflix earlier this year started talks with series producer Warner Brothers TV about another installment of the supernatural police drama beyond the upcoming fifth season, which had originally been billed as a final installment. The rest of the cast are also on board, according to Deadline.
The New York Times profiled actor Matthew Rhys, star of the upcoming Perry Mason origin-story series on HBO. Rhys explained that when he first learned of a planned Perry Mason remake, he had one question: "Oh God, why?" But Rhys, who played a Soviet sleeper agent in the FX espionage drama, The Americans, was drawn to the script which features a bleak and occasionally comic version, set in Depression-era Los Angeles. Unbathed, gin-soaked, and allergic to a close shave, Rhys’s Perry gets his gut punched, his chest burned, and his butt kicked. But as Rhys notes, "I wanted to know how this guy gets to the Perry Mason that we all think we know and love."
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO
Wrong Place, Write Crime welcomed Reed Farrel Coleman to share his experiences in writing Robert P. Parker's Jesse Stone series. He also gave a quick overview of his other series protagonists, Joseph Serpe, Gus Murphy, Gulliver Dowd, Dylan Klein, and Moe Prager, and discussed fellow author, Lawrence Block.
The latest Mysteryrat's Maze podcast is up, featuring an excerpt from The Wrong Girl by Donis Casey, as read by actors Maxwell Debbas and Brianne Vogt Debbas.
On the All About Agatha podcast, Ruth Ware, author of five bestselling psychological crime thrillers, stopped by to chat about her books and her appreciation for Agatha Christie.
Suspense Radio's Beyond the Cover welcomed Kay Hooper, author of over sixty books who is best known for her "Bishop / Special Crimes Unit" series.
The featured guest on Speaking of Mysteries was Paul D. Marks, discussing his latest, The Blues Don't Care, featuring a young jazz pianist with a secret in World War II-era Los Angeles.
Meet the Thriller Author focused on Scott Carson, a/k/a Michael Koryta, a New York Times bestselling author and screenwriter who currently lives in New England.
Lori Rader-Day stopped by It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club to discuss her latest crime novel, The Lucky One.
The Tartan Noir Show was joined by Denise Mina to talk about her twenty years writing about Glasgow. There was also discussion about representation of the working class in crime fiction, Edgar Allan Poe (who went to school in Ayrshire), and the appeal of true crime.
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