[The Daily] In the Works: Chazelle, Leder, and More

“American Gods star Pablo Schreiber will play astronaut Jim Lovell in Damien Chazelle’s moon-mission movie First Man,” reports Deadline’s Anthony D’Alessandro. In March, D’Alessandro noted that the story, based on James R. Hansen’s 2005 book, “follows NASA’s mission to land a man on the moon, centering around Neil Armstrong and the years 1961-1969.” Reuniting with the La La Land director, Ryan Gosling will play Armstrong.

“Justin Theroux, Kathy Bates, and Sam Waterston have joined Felicity Jones in the Ruth Bader Ginsburg biopic On the Basis of Sex,” reports Variety’s Dave McNary. “Armie Hammer will portray Ginsburg’s husband, Marty, as they team to bring the first landmark gender discrimination case before the Supreme Court. Jack Reynor (Detroit), Stephen Root, and Cailee Spaeny have also joined the cast, with Mimi Leder directing a script by Ginsburg’s nephew, Daniel Stiepleman.”

Eva Husson (Bang Gang) is shooting Les Filles du soleil with Golshifteh Farahani (Paterson) and Emmanuelle Bercot (À Tout de Suite), reports Fabien Lemercier for Cineuropa. The story “begins somewhere in Kurdistan. Bahar (Farahani), the commanding officer of the Daughters of the Sun, a battalion made up entirely of Kurdish female soldiers, is on the cusp of taking back control of the city where she was captured by extremists just a few months prior. French journalist Mathilde (Bercot) is covering the first three days of the offensive. When the two women meet, all of Bahar’s experiences since the men in black burst into her life come bubbling back to the surface.”

Hugh Hefner passed away just last week at the age of ninety-one, and a biopic is already in the works. Brett Ratner has cast Jared Leto as the founder of Playboy, saying, according to Brian Porreca and Seth Abramovitch in the Hollywood Reporter, “When he heard I got the rights to Hef’s story, he told me, ‘I want to play him. I want to understand him.’ And I really believe Jared can do it. He’s one of the great actors of today.’”

Luc Besson has written a sequel to his 2014 film Lucy, which starred Scarlett Johansson. Variety’s Elsa Keslassy mentions the project in her report on his studio’s plans “to scale back its ambitions and rejig its strategy to climb out of the red.”

“Universal Pictures and Disney arm Buena Vista International are teaming for Glass, M. Night Shyamalan’s latest thriller, which began production Monday,” reports THR’s Borys Kit. And spoiler alert, I suppose: “Glass is the sequel to Unbreakable, which starred Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson, and was released by Disney’s Touchstone label. But it is also a follow-up to Split, Shyamalan's surprise hit from earlier this year that starred James McAvoy and was released by Universal.”

Judy Greer is in negotiations to star in David Gordon Green and Danny McBride’s Halloween re-launch,” reports Deadline’s Amanda N’Duka. “Jamie Lee Curtis is reprising her role as Laurie Strode in the Michael Myers horror franchise. Greer in talks to play Karen Strode, the daughter of Laurie.”

VIDEO

Daisy Ridley might squeeze Daddio into her schedule before she starts work on Star Wars: Episode IX, reports Variety’s Justin Kroll: “Christy Hall penned the script, which follows a woman who is picked up by a cab at JFK airport and driven to her apartment in Manhattan. On the way there, the woman and cabdriver begin discussing their past and current relationships and the effects those relationships have had on their lives.”

SERIES

Back in July, Deadline’s Nellie Andreeva reported that Amazon had picked up a new adaptation of Joan Lindsay’s 1967 novel Picnic at Hanging Rock. The six-episode Australian series has been directed by Larysa Kondracki, “best known for her debut feature film, The Whistleblower starring Rachel Weisz”; Kondracki’s also “directed episodes of high-profile drama series like Legion, The Americans, and Better Call Saul.” Natalie Dormer (Game of Thrones) will play the “terrifying English headmistress, Mrs. Appleyard,” as Maile Meloy calls her at the Literary Hub, where she delves into the mystery of what happened to the schoolgirls who disappear. “When director Peter Weir went to discuss the film rights for his 1975 adaptation, he was warned not to ask if something had really happened, but he did anyway. Lindsay said she hoped he wouldn’t ask again. So Weir asked if the question of what occurred was open-ended. Could they have fallen down a hole or been abducted by aliens? She said yes, it could have been any of the above.” The series premieres next year.

One of the most anticipated series of 2018, Joel and Ethan Coen’s The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, has just wrapped a stretch of shooting in western Nebraska. “The project began in New Mexico, filmed for a period in Colorado and then finished in Nebraska along the historic trails relevant to the theme of the story set in in the 19th century,” reads a story from the City of Scottsbluff in the Star Herald. “A period production, the props included a wagon train, horses, oxen, mules and a variety of animals moving across the prairie. The Nebraska landscape has a starring role in this production.”

“Gaumont, the studio behind streaming hit Narcos, has signed a first-look TV deal with Oscar-nominated screenwriter, director and producer J.C. Chandor, whose credits include Margin Call, All Is Lost, and A Most Violent Year,” reports Variety’s Elsa Keslassy.

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