[The Daily] In the Works: Poehler, Alverson, and More

Amy Poehler, seen above with Tina Fey in Sisters (2015), “will make her feature directorial debut with Wine Country, a Netflix comedy she will also star in and produce.” The Hollywood Reporter’s Borys Kit: “Poehler has assembled an all-star lineup of fellow comedians for her project, with Rachel Dratch, Ana Gasteyer, Paula Pell, Maya Rudolph, and Emily Spivey joining her on the call sheet. Longtime partner in crime Tina Fey will also be on hand. . . . Wine Country tells the story of old friends who go to Napa for a weekend getaway to celebrate a fiftieth birthday.”

Jeff Goldblum will play Walter Jackson Freeman II, a doctor known for advocating the lobotomy—he performed hundreds of them in the first half of the twentieth century—in Rick Alverson’s The Mountain, co-written with Dustin Guy Defa and Colm O’Leary, reports IndieWire’s Kate Erbland. The cast includes Tye Sheridan, Udo Kier, Denis Lavant, and Hannah Gross.

David Michôd will direct Joel Edgerton and Timothée Chalamet in The King for Netflix, reports Variety’s Justin Kroll. “Based on Shakespeare’s plays Henry IV and Henry V, Chalamet portrays in the pic a young, disgraced prince who inherits the crown and must learn what it means to be a king, guided by his one true friend, Falstaff (Edgerton).”

Maryam Keshavarz (Circumstance) will direct Susan Sarandon, Edie Falco, and Matt Bomer in Vulture Club, “the first major project from YouTube Red that has some real star power and talent behind it,” as Charles Barfield notes at the Playlist. Keshavarz says the film “follows the singular journey of a woman abandoned by her government who finds community in the most unexpected places.”

“Alicia Vikander and Riley Keough are finishing deals to star for Wash Westmoreland, who wrote the script and will direct” an adaptation of the Susanna Jones novel The Earthquake Bird, reports Deadline’s Mike Fleming Jr. Set in Tokyo, it’s “the story of young female expat who is suspected of murder after her friend goes missing in the wake of a tumultuous love triangle with a handsome local photographer.”

Pierre Morel (Taken) will direct Claes Bang (The Square) in The New Mrs. Keller, reports Variety’s Dave McNary. “The story, set in the near future, follows the smart, beautiful, and sophisticated titular Keller. She ensnares her husband, prominent surgeon Dr. David Keller, in a tense deception as his world unravels.”

According to Variety’s Shirley Halperin, “an animated film project starring the Spice Girls is being shopped to potential production partners” and “all five members of the group have signed off on their likenesses being used for a superhero-themed movie working off of the ‘girl power’ message.”

SERIES

At the Playlist, Charles Barfield also reports that Netflix has set up an April 9 worldwide release for Brillante Mendoza’s Amo. The twelve-part series “tells the story of the controversies surrounding the Philippine National Police and the government’s campaign against drugs, with each episode focusing on a different character.”

Michael Stuhlbarg (Call Me by Your Name) and Matt Lauria (Friday Night Lights) are joining Emma Appleton (The End of the F***ing World) and Luke Treadaway (Attack the Block) in Channel 4’s Jerusalem, “written by Masters of Sex and Boardwalk Empire writer Bash Doran,” reports Peter White for Deadline. “Appleton plays Feef Symonds, a bold and ambitious 20-something woman who joins the Civil Service in 1945, just as Attlee’s Labour party sweeps to victory, while Lauria stars as her American lover Peter and Stuhlbarg plays fellow American and zealot Rowe.”

THEATER

“Ethan Hawke and Paul Dano will star as mismatched brothers in a coming Broadway production of Sam Shepard’s True West directed by James Macdonald,” reports Peter Libbey for the New York Times. Opening night will be January 24, 2019. “True West was last performed on Broadway in 2000, with Philip Seymour Hoffman and John C. Reilly taking turns playing the leading roles.”

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