The Pope’s Exorcist sequel gets the greenlight

It’s been one year since Columbia Pictures / Screen Gems brought The Pope’s Exorcist (read our review HERE), a supernatural thriller starring Russell Crowe, to theatres. Just two weeks after the film was released, our friends at Bloody Disgusting heard that a sequel was in development… but then things went quiet for a while. Crowe recently said that The Pope’s Exorcist was meant to kick off a trilogy, but the franchise’s progress had been slowed down by “a change of studio heads.” Things have apparently been worked out, though, because producer Jeff Katz of Worldwide Katz has just taken to social media to announce that the Pope’s Exorcist sequel has been given the greenlight!

Katz wrote, “Amorth Nation — I just got the call. IT’S OFFICIALLY HAPPENING!!! “È un seguito, amici miei.”* Thank you to the amazing #ThePopesExorcist fans. You made this happen. Gas up your Lambretta – and get ready to ride.” * “It’s a sequel, my friends.”

A while back, The Exorcist director William Friedkin made a documentary about Father Gabriele Amorth (and you can read our review of The Devil and Father Amorth at THIS LINK), a real-life exorcist who passed away in 2016 at the age of 91. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Screen Gems acquired the rights to tell the story of the exorcist’s life from Michael Patrick Kaczmarek and faith-based media company Loyola Productions. That deal included rights to Amorth’s two international bestselling memoirs An Exorcist Tells His Story and An Exorcist: More Stories, as well as other “detailed accounts of his exploits of pulling the devil out of people all over the world.”

For The Pope’s Exorcist, Crowe took on the role of real-life figure Father Gabriele Amorth, a priest who acted as chief exorcist of the Vatican and who performed more than 100,000 exorcisms in his lifetime. Amorth wrote two memoirs and detailed his experiences battling Satan and demons that had clutched people in their evil.

Overlord‘s Julius Avery directed The Pope’s Exorcist from a screenplay by Evan Spiliotopoulos, with revisions by Chuck MacLean. The script was based on original drafts by Chester Hastings & R. Dean McCreary, which received revisions from Michael Petroni.

Crowe was joined in the cast by Alex Essoe (Starry Eyes), Daniel Zovatto (It Follows), Laurel Marsden (Ms. Marvel), Cornell S. John (Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald), and newcomer Peter DeSouza-Feighoney, with Franco Nero, star of the original Django, as the Pope. Ralph Ineson (The Witch) provided the voice of a demon.

Scott Strauss, Michael Bitar, and Giselle Johnson oversaw the project for Screen Gems. The film was produced by Michael Patrick Kaczmarek through his company Jesus & Mary, Loyola president Eddie Siebert, Doug Belgrad of 2.0 Entertainment, and Katz.

Are you glad to hear that the sequel to The Pope’s Exorcist is moving forward? Share your thoughts on this one by leaving a comment below.