Edgar Wright To Direct Johnny Depp In Disney's Reboot Of '70s Horror Series 'The Night Stalker'

News

by Oliver Lyttelton
February 22, 2012 2:21 PM
9 Comments

It's been a year and a half since "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World" hit theaters, and director Edgar Wright has continued to remain mum on what might be next. He's been busy, for certain, with Marvel movie "Ant Man," and original scripts for "Baby Driver" and "Shaun of the Dead"/"Hot Fuzz" follow up "The World's End" all percolating, but with little firm news on any as they continued to be developed. Well, it's unlikely to be his next film, but it's just been revealed that Wright's got another project, and it's with the biggest movie star on the planet.

Deadline report that Disney have attached Wright to direct "The Night Stalker," a big-screen reboot of the 1970s TV movie and subsequent series that will star and be produced by Johnny Depp. The show starred Darren McGavin as Las Vegas newspaper reporter Carl Kolchak, who comes up against vampires at first, and then a variety of other paranormal creatures. The character and series was a major influence on "The X-Files," among others, and the remake was set up last summer by Depp's Infinitum Nihil production company.

It's still at very early stages: there's no writer on board yet, but Wright will work with Depp, Disney and producer Christi Dembrowksi on developing the film, which, being a Disney production, will be a PG-13 tentpole. As such, we don't imagine it'll be the director's next film, but will likely follow on from that. Still, it seems a good fit for his sensibilities, it'll give him his widest audience yet, and we're infinitely more excited about the project with his involvement than we would have been with, say, Tim Burton at the helm.

News

More: Edgar Wright, Johnny Depp, The Night Stalker, Walt Disney Pictures

9 Comments

| Reply
Bakunin | February 22, 2012 10:25 PMReply

They should have hired Chris Carter for the screenplay. Carter always cited Night Stalker as a major influence on The X-Files.
padre | February 22, 2012 7:41 PMReply

Love Depp, but this is going to flop so hard. The quirky niche director is going to take the quirky niche subject matter, and blow up its quirky niche attributes to candy cane vomit levels, to the delight of a very, very tiny niche audience. Again. But on the plus side, at least we can look forward to fanboy bloggers puffing it up for a solid year, only to be humiliated when it dies at the box office and the fanboy bloggers are proved to be completely impotent and ignored by real audiences. Again. Hilarious fun times ahead.
Vincent Drambuie | February 22, 2012 6:11 PMReply

The 2nd made for tv movie was set in Seattle.
shk | February 22, 2012 4:58 PMReply

Depp's going to be in a good movie? :)
jt | February 22, 2012 2:35 PMReply

I loved this original show and the reruns that used to air on the Sci-fi network. I just can't see Edgar doing this series justice.
franny faiz | February 22, 2012 2:32 PMReply

is johnny depp in a race with someone to see if he can be the richest man alive?
Mike | February 22, 2012 2:26 PMReply

Kolchak was a reporter based in Chicago. Sometimes he went to Las Vegas for a story but he went all over the country.
Joe Nobody | February 22, 2012 5:24 PM

In the original TV film he was from Vegas and then in the second film they switched him to Chicago.
hmm | February 22, 2012 2:46 PM

Thank christ we got THAT cleared up.