I'm noticing a ramp up again of production news following the usual summer slow-down, including some reports to pass along about crime novel adaptations (and some tangential projects):
THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES
Robert De Niro will re-team with his director Barry Levinson for a new crime drama called Wise Guys set at Warner Bros., which would have De Niro playing not one but two of the 20th Century’s biggest crime bosses. Nicholas Pileggi wrote the original crime script that would follow the stories of Vito Genovese and Frank Costello, the heads of two Italian-American mafia families that went to war in the 1950s, leading Genovese to attempt to assassinate Costello. De Niro would be slated to play the roles of both Genovese and Costello in the film. Pileggi is the author of a book called Wiseguys that served as the basis for Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas from 1990.
Mammoth Pictures has acquired film and TV rights to the bestselling novella, Diary of a Murderer, from award-winning Korean author Young-ha Kim, with Kourosh Ahari set to direct an English-language feature adaptation. Diary of a Murderer tells the story of a former serial killer stricken with Alzheimer’s disease and suffering from escalating memory loss. When his now peaceful life with his daughter is threatened by new killings mimicking his murders of decades past, he sets his sights on one final kill before he loses his memory completely: the new serial killer he suspects is stalking his daughter—all told in a series of notes the narrator writes to himself throughout his psychological descent into dementia. Kim’s novella was previously adapted by Korean director Shin-yeon Won as Memoir of a Murder.
Ryan Gosling is in talks to star opposite Margot Robbie in the new Ocean’s Eleven film, which four-time Emmy winner Jay Roach (Bombshell) will direct for Warner Bros. Deadline reported that the new Ocean’s version, penned by Carrie Solomon, will be set in Europe in the 1960s but further details about the plot are unknown. Both the original Rat Pack version from the 1960s and the 2001 reboot with George Clooney leading an all-star ensemble cast, are loosely based on a story by George Clayton Johnson and Jack Golden Russell.
Britt Lower (Severance), Tom Mercier (We Are Who We Are), Jean Yoon (Kim’s Convenience) and Sook-Yin Lee (Shortbus) are set to star in the drama/thriller/romance, The Incident Report. The film is executive-produced by Academy Award-winning Charlie Kaufman (I’m Thinking of Ending Things), and written/directed by Naomi Jaye (The Pin). The story follows librarian Miriam Gordon (Lower) as she lives in a fog of grief while working amidst marginalized members of the public who populate her downtown public branch. When a burgeoning love-affair with Janko, a younger foreign cab driver (Mercier) coincides with her receiving a series of oddly threatening letters addressed to her, Miriam’s sheltered existence is cracked open. The Incident Report is Jaye’s adaptation of the novel written by Martha Baillie.
The ensemble for Jeff Nichols's next feature film is continuing to grow as Michael Shannon, Boyd Holbrook, and Damon Herriman have joined The Bikeriders at New Regency. As previously announced, Austin Butler, Jodie Comer, and Tom Hardy were already on board. Nichols will direct the fictional story inspired by the photography of Danny Lyon and his 1967 book, The Bikeriders. The film is set in the 1960s following the rise of a fictional Midwestern motorcycle club. Seen through the lives of its members, the club evolves over the course of a decade from a gathering place for local outsiders into a more sinister gang, threatening the original group’s unique way of life.
TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES
Steven Pasquale has been tapped as the male lead opposite Neve Campbell in Avalon, ABC’s drama series based on Michael Connelly’s short story, from David E. Kelley, A+E Studios, and 20th Television. Avalon, which received a straight-to-series order from ABC, takes place in the city of Avalon on Catalina Island, where L.A. Sheriff’s Department Detective Nicole "Nic" Searcy (Campbell) heads up a small office. Catalina has a local population that serves more than one million tourists a year, and each day when the ferries arrive, hundreds of potential new stories enter the island. Detective Searcy is pulled into a career-defining mystery that will challenge everything she knows about herself and the island.
Irish writer Joe Murtagh, whose first feature, Calm With Horses (adapted from a short story of the same name by Colin Barrett and nominated for 5 BAFTA Awards), has a new project headed to the BBC and Showtime. The gothic thriller, The Woman in the Wall, is inspired by Ireland’s controversial Magdalene Laundries, which operated in Ireland for more than 200 years. But it wasn’t until 1993, when the unmarked graves of 155 women were uncovered in the convent grounds of one of the laundries, that media uncovered the operations of the secretive institution. Ruth Wilson (The Affair) will play Lorna, one of the former "fallen women" who were incarcerated at the Magdalene Laundries, who is now a suspect in a murder, and Daryl McCormack (Peaky Blinders) will play the ambitious but elusive Detective Colman Akande, who is hot on Lorna's trail while hiding his own dark secrets.
ITV announced the premiere date for The Suspect, based on Michael Robotham’s novel of the same name. The drama, starring Aidan Turner, has the Irish star playing Doctor Joe O’Loughlin who appears to have a perfect life with a devoted wife, a loving daughter, and a successful practice as a criminal psychologist complete with a high media profile and publishing deal. When a young woman is found dead he is only too willing to offer help with his profiling and expertise. But as the investigation into the woman’s death gathers pace, we start to ask, do we know the real Joe, or does he have a secret life?
PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO/AUDIO
NPR's Morning Edition tried to untangle the contradictions of crime novelist Patricia Highsmith.
Actor Jack Quaid is moving into scripted podcast audio dramas, leading the lineup of Echoverse’s Grim Death & Bill The Electrocuted Criminal series, which comes from Hellboy’s Mike Mignola and author Thomas Sniegoski. Quaid will star as Bentley Hawthorne, aka Grim Death, who works in the service of Death, avenging the wrongful deaths of those in need of justice. Helping him are an acerbic raven named Roderick, his wry and long-suffering butler Pym, headstrong and intelligent investigative journalist Gwendolyn, and the subject of the first season’s investigation, Bill, a strong but gentle man who has been wrongfully convicted of the murder of his trapeze-artist girlfriend Tianna.
The Crime Cafe podcast featured Debbi Mack's interview with crime writer, Joel Burcat, who writes a series of environmental thrillers.
On Queer Writers of Crime, Justene and Brad discussed the Christopher & Eric podcast and also profiled Christopher Rice, author of Decimate, in which a desperate family confronts the mysteries that lie between life and death.
It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club featured Kathy Reichs's latest Temperance Brennan novel, Cold Cold Bones.
Spybrary host Shane Whaley found out more about the traitor Robert Hanssen in an interview with author Lis Wiehl.
My Favorite Detective Stories welcomed Cathi Stoler to discuss her urban thriller, Last Call, the second book in the Murder on the Rocks Mystery series featuring The Corner Lounge bar owner, Jude Dillane.
Crime Time FM's Mark Ellis chatted with Paul Burke about the latest Frank Merlin mystery, Dead in the Water; wartime London; the American army in the UK; what makes good historical writing; and the richest man on the planet during the Second World War, Calouste Gulbenkian.
The Red Hot Chili Writers spoke with criminal defense lawyer turned crime writer Nadine Matheson; discussed the row over film "intimacy coordinators"; paid tribute to a pioneering hamster; and chatted about the iconic musical Grease.
THEATRE
Adrienne Kennedy's Ohio State Murders, starring Tony winner Audra McDonald, has announced its Broadway venue and dates. The previously announced production will be the first show to play the newly renamed and renovated James Earl Jones Theatre, formerly known as the Cort Theatre, when it begins performances on November 11 ahead of opening on December 8. Tony winner Kenny Leon will direct, and additional casting and the creative team will be announced later. Ohio State Murders is described as "an unusual look at the destructiveness of racism in the United States." When Suzanne Alexander, a fictional Black writer, returns to Ohio State University to talk about the violence in her writing, a dark mystery begins to unravel.
A site-specific production of Agatha Christie's Witness for the Prosecution is currently being staged in a unique courtroom setting inside London County Hall, adjacent to the London Eye on the South Bank of the Thames. Christie’s court classic sees Leonard Vole called to the stand after a murder. When his wife agrees to testify, can she be trusted? It’s up to the audience, as the jury, to decide whether Vole will walk free or spend a life in shackles. Developed with the support and involvement of the Christie family, the new production is directed by Lucy Bailey and will place the audience in the center of the action within the courtroom.
Murder on the Orient Express, adapted by Ken Ludwig from the story by Agatha Christie, will play at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia from September 3 through October 5. World-famous detective Hercule Poirot is headed to London aboard the luxurious Orient Express, a train packed with the most eccentric passengers ever seen. Trouble begins when a snowdrift stops the Express in its tracks, and the situation quickly spirals from bad to worse when one of the passengers is found murdered in his compartment. Can Poirot solve the crime before it’s too late?
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