If you just look at the stunning success of dystopian YA adaptation Divergent, which raked in $56 million over the course of its opening weekend, you might start to believe that bringing beloved books to the big screen is a no-brainer. However, widening the scope a little shows that scoring hits with YA adaptations is a decidedly tricky business. In the past twelve months alone, we've seen The Host, Beautiful Creatures, The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones, Ender's Game and Vampire Academy all flop spectacularly. And while Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters, Fox's second attempt to spin Rick Riordan's bestselling adventure series into box office gold, wasn't an outright failure, its returns have been less than impressive as well.
A few weeks ago, we reported that Fox had narrowed the pool of candidates for the role of Doctor Doom in its Fantastic Four reboot to four actors: Sam Riley, Eddie Redmayne, Domnhall Gleeson and Toby Kebbell. Now, it appears that we have a winner, with news that Kebbell has been officially offered the part.
Casting for the main roles in Terminator: Genesis, Skydance and Paramount's upcoming reboot of the iconic Terminator franchise, concluded last week when Dayo Okeniyi signed on for the role of Danny Dyson, the brilliant inventor son of Cyberdene Systems employee Miles Dyson (played by Joe Morton in Terminator 2: Judgment Day). Now, the producers are getting to work rounding out the cast with some supporting players.
Continuing the original film's tactic of incorporating fresh new voices in cinema, Chronicle 2 has gained a screenwriter in the form of newcomer Jack Stanley, Deadline reports.
Today, Skydance Productions and Paramount Pictures completed main casting for their upcoming franchise reboot, Terminator: Genesis, with the casting of Nigerian actor Dayo Okeniyi in the key role of Danny Dyson, a brilliant inventor who, according to sources, factors heavily into the conclusion of Genesis and is also the son of cyborg developer Miles Dyson (played by Joe Morton in Terminator 2: Judgment Day).
In the latest of many Hollywood toss-ups, following competing friends-with-benefits, Snow White and White House takeover movies, Warner Bros. and Disney are going head-to-head with different adaptations of Rudyard Kipling's classic The Jungle Book.
After Steven Soderbergh's terrific comedy-drama Magic Mike, about the lives of male strippers, grossed an astounding $167 million against a budget of $7 million, a sequel was immediately inevitable. However, star Channing Tatum's busy schedule and Soderbergh's retirement prevented Magic Mike 2 from going full steam ahead back in 2012, and there hasn't been much news about its progress ever since.
2013 was a pretty awful year for Hollywood in terms of the actors we lost, and perhaps no death was as shocking and unexpected as that of The Sopranos star James Gandolfini, who passed away from a heart attack at 51 last June. However, filmgoers have still not seen the last of the prolific actor, who posthumously touched our hearts with the bittersweet romantic comedy Enough Said and is also set to star in an upcoming drama called The Drop.
With Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales still to be green-lit, and a sequel to Tron: Legacy still in early development stages, Disney certainly has a keen interest in launching new franchises. And though The Sorcerer's Apprentice disappointed at the box office, the studio evidently isn't giving up on magicians just yet. Today we have news that the House of Mouse has tapped Patrick Massett and John Zinman, the writers behind Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, to pen an adaptation of T.A. Barron's high fantasy series The Lost Years of Merlin, tentatively known as Young Merlin.
Greendale Human Beings, rejoice! Community, NBC's gloriously witty and inventive comedy, may actually fulfill its promise of six seasons and a movie, according to a recent TV Guide report.
